Advise in preperation for mortgage application

christologymum

Ok this will be a long one, our house is on the market and we are trying to max the chances of a new mortgage going through as easy as possible. Im thinking of the things the bank will be looking for so this is how it is, please advise if we can do anything to improve things or are we doing it the best way.

I have a santander account my wages and my expenses (Approx £200 fuel expenses back from money ive paid out previous month) all go into this account. No dd's but I pay for all fuel, food shopping out of this account, plus take out between £100-150 a month cash to last all month for the odd take away, window cleaner, dinner monies, odd meal out etc, once its gone unless its an emergancy nothing else is withdrawn. Whatever isnt accounted for for living is transfered to savings, approx £600 a month. I have £100 overdraft which i try and keep out of but may go in a bit just before payday but any longer and I transfer a bit from savings although rare. So all transactions are mainly tesco, lol.

Then we have a nationwide account hubbys wages, child benefit, tax credits etc all go into. All the dds come from this account, no general spending. After all dd's are piad the rest gets transfered to savings, approx £500 a month. We have a regular saver with nationwide and a esaving account. Approx 2k in savings. He has no overdraft.

I have one credit card with a 2k limit, zero balance. I put the occasional internet purchase on it but pay off in full every month. Car on finances, £280 a month, only taken out 5 months ago, in hindsight was a bad move. No other debt. 1 missed payment on a settled card from 2012, everything else ok.

Husband has 5 credit cards, with a total available of approx 11k, but balance on all zero. He again will buy the occasional thing off the internet if needed and pay it off in full. Wondering whether to close some of these accounts down, and just keep 2/3 open. What would you recommend. He also has his car on finance owing 3k, to be paid off in just over a year. He also has a very account with £750 on which is interest free for 12 month so havent paid off yet, but can do. He had 4 missed payments, but have managed to get 2 removed but still leaves vodafone from last year which we are still fighting but not getting very far. A missed payment from July and Oct.

So I know a bank will go over bank statements with a fine tooth comb, can we do anything else to make them look better.
Shall we close down some of his visas?
Someone mentioned that late payments on phone bills are not looked at as bad as say a loan/mortgage, is there no difference? Im just thinking worse case vodafone wont remove them. Will these two make a massive difference.

Total income £55k, wanting to borrow £190k with ideally a 5% deposit but could stretch to 10% if have to.

Any advise welcome.

christologymum

Anyone....please

CreditCrunchie

I believe it can take up to six months for changes to have a real effect on your file. So anything like closing down accounts or credit cards etc should be done well in advance as this can cause a temporary drop. Keep your oldest card and account though as the longer you've been with a bank the better it looks. Apparently it's more usual for them to ask for your loans to be cleared before you apply now, and that too can take time. Good luck.

christologymum

Ok thanks for that. Will def close some down as it goes the oldest are the highest interest so that would be best.

PaulW922

It does not sound like you have too much to worry about - I think any future mortgage is likely to be guided by what you can afford more than your credit history