Buy To Let - A Possibility?

nonnatus

Hi,

We have had a mortgage for the last two years. We paid for the house half cash, mortgage on the rest of it. No problems paying the Mortgage.

Our long term plans are that in two years, when the kids have gone off to Uni / Work, we are re-locating to a Welsh house with enough space to keep animals and host Bed and Breakfast. The traditional "Good-Life, Self Sufficient daydream that lots of people yearn for.

We have at the moment around £100k in Savings / Premium Bonds etc, all easy to access if needed.

Last night, we were busy pottering around on Rightmove and (STUPIDLY) have seen the most perfect property. Priced around £400k so we'll use that to make numbers easy!

We HAVE a 25% deposit. Could we buy this house with a Buy to Let mortgage? There is a third person involved in our future plans who will be moving with us and in theory, he could "pay the rent" for the next couple of years and live at the house, getting it ready for us etc.
Then in 2016, we would sell the house we currently live in and use the proceeds to pay off the Buy to Let mortgage entirely, allowing us to live Mortgage Free in the house of our dreams!!

Sounds good so far?

The PROBLEM is our current income. When we bought THIS house, I had been running an online business which had healthy accounts going back a couple of years. Mortgage people were happy with that.
However I have now SOLD that business and bought into a franchise that is entirely different. I'm loving it and it's going great guns but I only have 6 months of Accounts and they don't paint a great picture yet (understandably I think...!).
My partner in all this is retired and has State / Private pensions of £12k a year.

So the question is - is this impossible? Does a Buy to Let Mortgage base acceptability on existing income, much like a traditional mortgage (no good for us now), or is it based on finding a tenant to pay the mortgage (which will be a piece of cake)?

Thanks for reading and for any thoughts. I have an appointment with a Broker next week but thought I'd get some ammunition and knowledge before then to fight my corner...

jacobtheamish

There is no lender I am aware of who will be happy to provide a buy to let mortgage without at least 2 years accounts, aside from that most BTL providers will want a AST in place, 'renting' to your friend could limit the providers.

Its painful to say but when playing to borrow via the mortgage route, it is advisable for borrowers to have less tax efficient years if you know what I mean along with ideally 3 years accounts. An average income of £20,000 is a min.
Sorry