Approval in Principle - First time buyers

jwmsport

Good evening,

Myself and my partner are embarking upon the mortgage application process. We have a healthy deposit, secure employment, no debt and excellent credit ratings. We have already secured an agreement in principle from one lender.
Whilst completing the information required for the approval in principle we were informed that credit checks would take place and this could affect our future borrowing ability. It is with this that I have a question, I feel it may be prudent to run through agreement in principle procedure with several of the most competitive lenders, is this common\recommended practice? I would not of course then want multiple agreements (if it is not common practice to obtain several at this stage) to then apply several entries against our credit records if it in future may be frowned upon.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

Malmo

Is there any particular reason why you feel it would be prudent to run the AIP procedure several times? This isn't best practice, as the AIP involves a credit search. Whether this is a hard or soft search depends on the lender. Although a soft search isn't visible to other lenders searching your credit file, be very wary of the limited scope & limited usefulness of a AIP based on a soft search though, as old previous addresses aren't used beyond 3 years usually. Halifax are one such lender and a broker who recommends using Halifax just for the AIP with a view to using a different lender for the full application should be avoided in my view.

A hard search on the other hand will be visible to other lenders for up to 12 months, so obtaining several AIPs on this basis would not be recommended.

Senior_Paper_Monitor

Research the most competitive AND suitable lender for the loan you want (i.e having a clear target in mind - presumably an actual property) and then run DIP/AIP and application.


Multiple DIP/AIP as you describe will harm your credit position for many subsequent lenders.


Research is "prudent" - multiple random DIP/AIPs is not.