Increasing chances to get a good mortgage offer as a self employed freelancer

Chrispian

Hi guys,

I am self-employed and have recently started thinking about saving up for a deposit and building up my credit score for a house.
I am told that people like me are not favoured for mortgages by banks due to financial stability. My thinking is to spend the next 2 years saving money for a larger than normal deposit for a house around the 400,000 - 500,000 range, while also focusing my spending away from my debit cards and to my credit card to increase my credit score. My thinking behind this is, if I have a credit card limit of say £3,000 and I pay everything off every month for the next 2 years, that will do 2 things - increase my credit score, and show the bank that I can manage my money and I can afford a specific amount a month ( this is to counter the fact that I am a freelancer with no "stable" monthly income, even though I earn more than the average salary.)

I'm not sure who to talk to about this, but I'm just trying to make myself as favourable as I can to the bank when the time comes to ask them for a mortgage. So I decided to post here and hopefully someone can help me out

Thanks!

K_S

@chrispian A large deposit and a clean credit history are indeed helpful. But, as a "freelancer with no stable monthly income", the most important part of the equation to a lender is your income.

What do mean by freelance - do you provide services as a sole-trader and pay your own taxes, ad-hoc jobs on short PAYE contracts, services as a contractor, a mix and match of all this, etc.

You mention "self-employed" in the title so assuming that you are a sole-trader, the most important aspects will be -
- how long you have been self-employed (2+ years is best)
- what is the net-profit shown on your most recent 2 SA302s (tax calculations)