FTB couple: One employed, one self employed

kingstreet

Sorry. I've just realised I left out "allowable expenses" from here;-

Lenders use net profit. This is your gross profit, less capital allowances and allowable expenses but before personal tax allowances and tax deductions

which made the whole post look a little silly. Apologies all.

Spangled

Just to echo the advice given above about using a broker if you're self employed. I've had six mortgages in my life and used a broker to source three of them, including my current one.

I used a broker this time around because both my wife and I are currently self employed and given the more stringent lending climate we were finding that lenders' attitude to self-employed applicants differed wildly. We needed a broker who knew which lenders would be more sympathetic to SE applicants - we didn't want to trash our credit scores by applying direct to lenders who weren't interested. We found online lending calculators on lenders' websites to be sometimes misleading when it came to SE applicants.

I wouldn't rule out going direct to lenders again in the future - but using a broker was the best option for us this time.

Anyhow, we're now tied in to a five-year fix, so it's not something I (hopefully) need to worry about again until 2016...:)

Good luck!