Accord Mortgages

anupampaul

I am going to remortgage my house, now that 2 year fixed interest rates are quite low. I have a clean credit history. I have received 2 quotes from an IFA- one from Accord mortgages (2.19%) and the other from Abbey (2.39%). I have been told by my IFA that Accord are more fussy about lending and is likely to take more time- 6 weeks at least to approve and because I have a mortgage on another property that has been rented out (as I could not sell it while moving), they are more likely to delay/decline. Whereas, I have been given the impression that Abbey are relatively straight forward, don't ask many questions and the mortgage is likely to complete in 3 weeks. I would definitely like it to complete quicker although I am remortgaging as I am hoping to release some equity that would be of use to me soon. I can't be certain how reliable my IFA's information is as certainly I would be saving almost £1400 over 2 years (also considering the balance left after 2 years to be paid) by going for the Accord mortgage. I know that my IFA would get slightly more commission for the Abbey mortgage. I shall be highly grateful if anybody could share their expert opinion/ views about this dilemma.
Many thanks.

ExpertAdvice

Hi,

How much is your property worth and how much are you looking to remortgage?

Are the Accord and Abbey 2 yr fixed deals?

Do you have consent to let from your existing lender on the other property?

Also, are the monthly payments on the other property being covered by rent?

deejaybee

Certainly didn't find Abbey ( Santander ) to be un-fussy when we made a mortgage application - the telephone "interview" was more like an interrogation !!! and we have both banked with them for donkeys years.

In fact the broker we turned to for help said he could have predicted that Santander would be one of the banks that declined us...

Hope you get it sorted ok anyway..

Wh05apk

Accord have very good rates, but their processing is a nightmare for anything less than perfectly straight forward cases, if speed is a priority Abbey can be very quick.

anupampaul

ExpertAdvice wrote: »

Hi,

How much is your property worth and how much are you looking to remortgage?

The property is at 75% LTV.

Are the Accord and Abbey 2 yr fixed deals?

Yes, both are 2 yr fixed deals.

Do you have consent to let from your existing lender on the other property?

Yes

Also, are the monthly payments on the other property being covered by rent?

Yes, just £40 short.

Many thanks for your advice.

kingstreet

That 5.99% SVR is a killer if you have a change of circumstances and can't remortgage in two years.

You would be reliant on them offering you a decent customer retention product.

I had a client choose another lender at a higher initial rate because it had a lower SVR and commitment to giving existing borrowers rates as good as it gives new borrowers.

Are you going to make less than 10% of your mortgage term more important than the other 90+?

ACG

I cant stand accord, i used them once ages ago and refused to use them again until about 2-3 months ago when i thought i would give them another try for someone who i thought would be straightforward...

2.5x income, no credit issues, no commitments the only issue was a property in the background which was receiving rent 3x the monthly repayments - all good you would think?

They wanted 12 months statements showing rent had been received... tenants had changed in that period, so i then had to provide SA302s to show the income had been declared for the last 12 months! They also wanted bank statements for 12 months showing the payment had been received AND a mortgage statement showing she had made the mortgage payments on time - despite it all showing on her credit report?!?!?

They sent me an email asking for feedback... it was a pretty long email telling them their underwriters are pedantic and i wont be using them again.

Senior_Paper_Monitor

Your basic description of the characteristics of the two lenders given by your IFA is correct, BUT ...

Abbey have a very punitive calculation on second properties (whether residential, buy to let or permission to let). As part of the application process your IFA will have to use their online calculator designed specifically for this purpose to calculate the impact (it will be certainly be negative in the circumstances you describe - and probably considerably so) and carry this figure into the normal affordability calculator and actual application.

As others are saying , Accord are naturally a nightmare and many of their often incredibly complex - and sometimes completely weird - criteria are not published, so I take every case where we are considering Accord to the BDM for an in depth discussion before making any application. They simply don't permit second homes, and I can't recall how they treat consent to let in the background (and its not specifically published in their criteria on the intermediary site).

.... and do you have any kids ? Accord hate kids !!

egoode

I've received approval for an accord mortgage a few months ago. Not completed yet as the seller is moving slowly. The annoying thing I found was they would request certain documentation then come back a week later wanting even more.

As I'm a contractor with a limited company they wanted tax information as proof of how much I earn which is fair enough. However, they also wanted proof I had paid my tax as well but this was something they requested about 4 weeks after the application was initially submitted and took some time to get from HMRC which slowed things down considerably.

Wh05apk

egoode wrote: »

I've received approval for an accord mortgage a few months ago. Not completed yet as the seller is moving slowly. The annoying thing I found was they would request certain documentation then come back a week later wanting even more.

As I'm a contractor with a limited company they wanted tax information as proof of how much I earn which is fair enough. However, they also wanted proof I had paid my tax as well but this was something they requested about 4 weeks after the application was initially submitted and took some time to get from HMRC which slowed things down considerably.

This is fairly typical, and why I would not now use them for anything but a straight forward employed low income multiple/low ltv case.

anupampaul

Thanks to everybody for your valuable suggestions. I have now decided to go for the Abbey mortgage.