Mortgage guarantor!?

daniel31

Hi,
My partner and I have £30,000 worth of savings but are both going back to University in September. I am doing my PGCE (should be working full-time as a teacher in 1 year and receive a 6k bursary during study) and my partner is going to study Medicine for 5 years.
As we now know that we will be living in the same place for a fixed amount of time we have decided to buy a property but as students we can now not get a mortgage.
My parents were happy to guarantee our mortgage but my mother has recently left my father and as their terms of separation have not been decided upon they are not in a position to help.
We have seen a property in Brighton we like, it is a 2 bed at 169K as we would rent the second bedroom out for approx 400PCM.
I have now hit a wall and wonder if anyone has any suggestions. We have more than enough capital to cover the 10% deposit and the first years mortgage repayments and also with our loans/bursaries have some extra cash…
Does a guarantor on a mortgage have to be a parent/family member or can we ask a good friend of ours? As this is a tricky question to ask, what would you suggest doing to convince them that they are secure and not taking a risk? Would putting the first years payments in a bank account to prove we can make the payments be enough or should we offer a financial incentive.
Any other ideas? We just don’t want to be paying London rent for any longer than we have to, especially as we have the deposit!
Thanks J

UK007BullDog

It might be very hard to find a mortgage. If you do it will be with one of the so called sub-prime lenders which might mean higher interest rates = higher payments than a regular high street mortgage.

I would say wait one year until you have full time work and then try.

Anyone you wish could be a guarantor but the bank would ask them to get legal advice as they would be part of the mortgage.

Personally, as much as I love my friends and family I would only be a guarantor for my parents or my kids (only if well behaved and trustworthy) otherwise I would never go and do that, not even for my best friend.

Putting the money into an account to pay the mortgage would not prove anything as you could take the money out again at any time.

What kind of financial incentive are you talking about? All the bank is interested is:

1. Is the property valued at the right price so that they can sell it to get their money back.

2. Have you got enough income to afford the mortgage.