Mortgage after IVA

Greenbeab

My husband and I successfully completed out IVA July 2024. It is due to come off our credit file next month. We are already off the insolvency register. Iva started July 2019.

Has anyone any experience or knowledge of securing a mortgage post iva, particularly in regards to the percentage of deposit that may be required and if we can avail of High street rates in the future?

We are on track to have approx 25k saved in about 2 years. I am 42 and earn 32k, he is 42 and earns 41k. Will our ages effect the mortgage term?

Any help or advice welcome. I did try speak.to professionals but was told to come back closer to the time. We are based in Northern Ireland.

Thanks!

ACG

NI makes everything a whole lot tricker. There are specialist lenders and building societies who do not lend in NI so without researching it properly I could be a little off here but generally speaking...

Most lenders work off the discharge date which would mean in their eyes you are only 1 year out of the IVA and so deposits would probably need to be around 30% and rates over 6-7%.
However there are some lenders who work off the registration date, in which case you are coming up to 6 years so thats nice. However, if these lenders were involved in the IVA you could find they are an automatic decline. I think Natwest/RBS (Ulster?) work off the registration date as an example, but if they were included then it would be an automatic decline. 

The other issue is how your credit report looks. If some of those accounts took maybe 6 months to default, they could be showing on your credit report until the end of the year. You can speak to those companies though to see if they can backdate the default date to the IVA start date, bit of a faff but might help - get copies of all 3 credit reports. 

Can I just ask if you are not home owners, why did you not go bankrupt? (Not saying you should have btw, but it might have given you a few more options now). 

Greenbeab

Basically because we were advised at that time if we could avoid bankruptcy we would be better doing that. Plus our jobs would not let us continue if we were bankrupt. 

We bank with nationwide and I know they will consider 3 years after.

To be honest I was hoping for 10% deposit - 30% would be a real stretch for us

ACG

Nationwide are 3 years discharged. 
Im not saying 30% is your only option, im saying its more down to your credit reports and who was part of the IVA. The options will vary so much depending on those 2 things. 

You could be looking at 10% and normal rates tomorrow or 30% at high rates in a month or so or anything in between.