How far in advance of end of fixed term to start the remortgage process?

WLITC

So I know it’s way to too early now, but next May my fixed 2 year mortgage is up and I was wondering how far in advance of the fixed rate ending I should start the process of finding a new mortgage? A bit of a Google suggests it can take around 8 weeks to get the mortgage sorted, so maybe 3 months, so month to find a deal and 2 months to complete?  Appreciate I’m asking this quite far in advance, but it’s been a crazy year and time is flying by so quickly so I just want to ensure I have a reminder saved on my phone to start the process at some point so I don’t forget and then find myself scrambling to quickly find a deal.  

[Deleted User]

I start discussions with my remortgage clients 5-6 months in advance of the deal expiring.  

croft08

WLITC said:

So I know it’s way to too early now, but next May my fixed 2 year mortgage is up and I was wondering how far in advance of the fixed rate ending I should start the process of finding a new mortgage? A bit of a Google suggests it can take around 8 weeks to get the mortgage sorted, so maybe 3 months, so month to find a deal and 2 months to complete?  Appreciate I’m asking this quite far in advance, but it’s been a crazy year and time is flying by so quickly so I just want to ensure I have a reminder saved on my phone to start the process at some point so I don’t forget and then find myself scrambling to quickly find a deal.  

You could run the numbers and see if it's worthwhile doing an early exit...

WLITC

Deleted_User said:

I start discussions with my remortgage clients 5-6 months in advance of the deal expiring.  

Oh, didn’t think that it would be that far in advance to start planning.  Good to know though and certainly sounds like I would be best starting the process in Jan or Feb at least. 

croft08 said:

You could run the numbers and see if it's worthwhile doing an early exit...

Hadn’t considered that. I need to dig out the paper work to check what the early exit fee is. Given that the Governor or the Bank of England is taking about negative interest rates, is there an advantage to waiting until Jan after the end of the Brexit transition period? If markets fall and we go into negative interest, is that a possible good thing for lenders or do I risk that lending might be restrained and no further drop in interest rates in terms of the rates actually offered to customers?

Thrugelmir

Negative interest BOE base rate isn't on the agenda currently as will damage the banks further.  
If anything there's a hardening of both criteria and mortgage rates. Defaults , lower levels of business and increased costs are filtering through. 

[Deleted User]

If you do it in Jan and you secure a mortgage offer for 6 months then you've got that in place even if things tighten up or if rates go up.   If rates go down then reassess a few months later to see if worth going to a better rate.

The broker will/should manage this process 

csgohan4

Deleted_User said:

If you do it in Jan and you secure a mortgage offer for 6 months then you've got that in place even if things tighten up or if rates go up.   If rates go down then reassess a few months later to see if worth going to a better rate.

The broker will/should manage this process 

wouldn't that incur another set of broker costs, assuming one is paid on offer? so to get another mortgage offer would mean another set of fees?

[Deleted User]

csgohan4 said:

Deleted_User said:

If you do it in Jan and you secure a mortgage offer for 6 months then you've got that in place even if things tighten up or if rates go up.   If rates go down then reassess a few months later to see if worth going to a better rate.

The broker will/should manage this process 

wouldn't that incur another set of broker costs, assuming one is paid on offer? so to get another mortgage offer would mean another set of fees?

I'd be surprised if a broker charged twice for that. A good point though, worth checking with each broker.  Personally I only charge 1 fee for any amount of work on that transaction. So if I charge on offer for a purchase but it falls through later I don't charge again when the clients find a new house, even if its a change of lender. If I charge on remo offer but they later ask for more money for an extension I'll have to redo the whole case but I don't charge again

[Deleted User]

Usually an offer lasts for 6 months so upto that long.

I just switched from Halifax to First Direct and applied 3 months ahead of when my fix finished, that was plenty of time and probably could have been done in 3-4 weeks realistically. They conveyancer just paused for 2 months until my fixed rate ended before doing the transfers.