Remortgage (Non UK Resident) 3 November 2022 at 8:07AM in Mortgages & endowments 2 replies 83 views

Harmonica89

Hi there,

My fixed rate mortgage deal has ended and I’ll currently looking for a new deal due to the rising interest rates etc.

I’m looking for a buy to let mortgage as I’m letting out my UK property and a fixed deal. I currently live abroad.

I’ve tried many brokers and directly phoned banks and it’s pretty much impossible to find a fixed deal as a non UK resident where I need to remortgage approx £75000. My broker could only find one deal where I was locked into a variable rate where I may as well stay on the variable mortgage I’m on.

Does anyone have similar experience or advise?

To make matters worse my property is in Scotland and the Scottish government have frozen any possibility to increase rent until at least next March despite my rising costs on a monthly basis.

Any advise / experience would be greatly appreciated.

housebuyer143

Harmonica89 said:

Hi there,

My fixed rate mortgage deal has ended and I’ll currently looking for a new deal due to the rising interest rates etc.

I’m looking for a buy to let mortgage as I’m letting out my UK property and a fixed deal. I currently live abroad.

I’ve tried many brokers and directly phoned banks and it’s pretty much impossible to find a fixed deal as a non UK resident where I need to remortgage approx £75000. My broker could only find one deal where I was locked into a variable rate where I may as well stay on the variable mortgage I’m on.

Does anyone have similar experience or advise?

To make matters worse my property is in Scotland and the Scottish government have frozen any possibility to increase rent until at least next March despite my rising costs on a monthly basis.

Any advise / experience would be greatly appreciated.

You need a specialist buy to let broker. There are a good many lenders who will consider your situation. 
Google specialist BTL brokers and see what you find. You will be expected to pay though.
Avoid any that do residential as well like L&C etc as they are unlikely to specialise and any of the paid ads at the top of the search results.

K_S

Harmonica89 said:

Hi there,

My fixed rate mortgage deal has ended and I’ll currently looking for a new deal due to the rising interest rates etc.

I’m looking for a buy to let mortgage as I’m letting out my UK property and a fixed deal. I currently live abroad.

I’ve tried many brokers and directly phoned banks and it’s pretty much impossible to find a fixed deal as a non UK resident where I need to remortgage approx £75000. My broker could only find one deal where I was locked into a variable rate where I may as well stay on the variable mortgage I’m on.

Does anyone have similar experience or advise?

To make matters worse my property is in Scotland and the Scottish government have frozen any possibility to increase rent until at least next March despite my rising costs on a monthly basis.

Any advise / experience would be greatly appreciated.

@harmonica89 Unfortunately one issue is that you've hit bad timing. Since all the issues in the mortgage market last month, a lot of the lenders that offer expat BTL products have trimmed their offerings, tightened up borrowing standards and dropped fixed rates for discount rates. Combined with whatever your personal circumstances are, that might be one reason why multiple brokers (assuming that you've spoken to brokers outside the volume ones like L&C, Habito, etc. who aren't likely to be of much help) haven't been able to place the case.

And in any case, if you're with a mainstream lender, the SVR is likely to be very close to fixed rates available in the market currently, even for standard UK residents.

You could leave it on SVR, overpay as much as possible and review the market periodically, or look at low-ERC discount products and come back to the market in a couple of months. If none of that works, then perhaps it might be worth exploring whether you want to look at selling the property.