Santander Mortgage Rates

drdpj

When you port a mortgage you are essentially getting a whole new one and it's based on their current lending criteria. I have just ported my A&L lifetime tracker at BoE+0.99% (it was interest only, but I was making regular large capital payments) to a repayment product with additional borrowing at the same rate . I just phoned up and that was the option they offered me.

It sounds like your issues are around them not liking to lend past retirement (they certainly gave us the third degree on whether we could continue in the jobs we're in to retirement age) and not really anything to do with the rate you're on or that it's an A&L mortgage. You're just not stacking up against their current criteria:

Maximum age
We do not lend above an applicant's intended retirement age and we will not accept any case where your clients’ selected or anticipated age of intended retirement is over 75 years.

We undertake regular checks to assess the plausibility of your clients’ selected or anticipated age of retirement on all applications and we may request further information or evidence to support this.

See here: http://www.santanderforintermediaries.co.uk/content/mortgages/lending-criteria

adamcarvell

was my rate 3.29% fixed for 5 years a good one or should i keep phoning for a better one?. got 14 days to sign the paperwork.

cattermole

drdpj wrote: »

When you port a mortgage you are essentially getting a whole new one and it's based on their current lending criteria. I have just ported my A&L lifetime tracker at BoE+0.99% (it was interest only, but I was making regular large capital payments) to a repayment product with additional borrowing at the same rate . I just phoned up and that was the option they offered me.

It sounds like your issues are around them not liking to lend past retirement (they certainly gave us the third degree on whether we could continue in the jobs we're in to retirement age) and not really anything to do with the rate you're on or that it's an A&L mortgage. You're just not stacking up against their current criteria:



See here: http://www.santanderforintermediaries.co.uk/content/mortgages/lending-criteria

Thanks for the information yes I know it is to do with the criteria as well, although at first they refused to take into account the pension income. Regardless of this my main gripe with them was the whole lack of understanding the situation from the "young person" I spoke to.

I.e. it was very scripted and he seemed unable to grasp that a pension + part time salary was more in terms of net income, even if the gross figure was slightly less. Which is because of no NI payable on the pension and no or much lower pension contributions on the salary. We are not asking to lend after anything like to 75 it was at 74 for my husband on our existing term. We are happy to reduce this although we would prefer to keep the term longer and make overpayments. Because it gives leeway should interest rates rise drastically.

When I spoke to our bank the attitude was totally different and they talked through first what our needs were and they didn't seem to have a problem with it.

cattermole

And he also said that they didn't take Pension income into account which is incorrect on the link you provided I think I was perhaps just unlucky with the "adviser" I got that can always make a big difference.

The "link" is very useful thanks very much

drdpj

I think you hit the nail on the head though, it is scripted - they have a customer shaped box, and if you fit into it then it's fine, but if you don't then they're not very flexible. From what I've read on here it's much the same with most of the high street lenders, although some are more bendy with particular circumstances than others.

Good luck with getting something good sorted

cattermole

Thank you, I hope so too I'm pretty confident that our Bank will lend us and they have said so. But I don't want to pay more than necessary by being forced to swap lenders!

I did the Santander's intermediaries affordability calculator with ages! And it came out well within what we were requesting which is exactly the same as what we have now. We were well with in even if we only had a medium credit score. So not sure what was going on when I phoned up.

Sadly I think everything is scripted these days not just lenders all services and it's very annoying being read to off a computer screen by a robot.

gjchester

adamcarvell wrote: »

was my rate 3.29% fixed for 5 years a good one or should i keep phoning for a better one?. got 14 days to sign the paperwork.

There's no "best" rate, it will vary on what you want to borrow and the % of the house equity that makes (the Loan To Value) along with your age, credit history, the market sentiment and if the deal makes anything for the bank at all. If you not making much profit for them they'll not give you a stellar deal, why should they , like any business they'd probably prefer you move elsewhere and they only keep the most profitable customers.



Is it the best for you, that all depends on the risk you want to take, where do you think interest rates will go, and if your comfortable with payments as they will be under this deal.


Fixed give you security but don't give you any benefitsif the rate remains low. Will it go up, certainly will, the magic question is when and how fast. Five years is hard to call, my guess (and it is a guess) is we'll see rates below 1% for this year, maybe trending up to 2 or 3% by the end of year 5. Your banking they rise faster, me with a tracker I'm banking they rise slowly.


Also consider fees and your plan of when you will pay it off, in some cases its better to pay more, as savings you make are offset by fee's.


I used this Excel sheet when looking at options


http://www.locostfireblade.co.uk/spreadsheet/Index.html


It came from a thread on here, but if I've got the data right we are saving £3k on remortaging over the time we plan to pay it off. However a quick check with an independent broker said we could expect to pay around £2k on some of the better rate deals similar to what we were offered by Santander, (£1500 booking fee, £600 brokers fee) clearly if all we are saving is £1k over 5 years is it worth the hassle. We could have lesser fee mortgages but the rate was higher and it wasn't hugely better


Yes I know £2k is a lot of money, but there may be other costs and hassle changing providers that you may or may not feel is worth the saving, there may also be other gotcha's such as having to move your bank account in there too.


End of the day are you comfortable with it, you get 5 years piece of mind your rates are fixed, is that worth more to you than a potential saving or potential loss.

adamcarvell

we are staying with Santander just figuring out what to do for the best fix or tracker we have always had fixed . id like to save pay same as we are now as we used to it.

loulala1

adamcarvell wrote: »

was my rate 3.29% fixed for 5 years a good one or should i keep phoning for a better one?.

As I last remember you have 2 weeks to change your mind. You could keep calling over the next few weeks before you sign on the dotted line. I'm not sure if the rates you have are good or not as i haven't checked their rates lately. When I call I will let you know.

Thrugelmir

loulala1 wrote: »

I'm not sure if the rates you have are good or not as i haven't checked their rates lately.

Fixed rates have edged marginally higher in response to the cost of money in the wholesale markets.