Help to buy for a current shared owner

jgallcash

Hi guys,

There's a huge post coming up with specific details in the next week or so for advice but in the meantime I wonder if you could help with the following straight forward query.

I am a shared owner having bought an apartment from new in 2008 with my then partner, now wife. It was and still is our first mortgage and we are still on the same interest only deal that we got when approved in 2008.

The beauty at the time was that we didn't need a deposit. Our circumstances have changed for the better now and we would like to buy the remaining 40% of the property.

Would we qualify for help to buy? I know it's a long shot but I just wondered if we could argue it is our first property?

Failing that are there any reasonable 5% deals mortgage deals that are not specific to Help to buy that we might be able to access?

jgallcash

Any help at all would be appreciated.

kingstreet

What are you trying to achieve that you think HTB will help with?

This is useful to those buying who have only a small deposit. If you are trying to staircase to 100% ownership, the equity in your current share is your deposit.

Is that not enough?

jgallcash

We bought from new and as such were immediately in negative equity. Also the current mortgage is Interest only - without doing a valuation I would say we are at the same price now than when we bought it in 2008.

Thus I don't have a large deposit and little if any equity.

kingstreet

I see.

Frankly, I have absolutely no idea if there's a lender/product out there for a staircase to 100% with little deposit.

You'll just have to roll your sleeves up and hit the phone. Brokers, lenders, MAS, net, the lot.

Thrugelmir

Switch your mortgage onto a repayment basis and start repaying the capital. At the moment you are little more than renting.