Mortgage break ( maternity leave)

dana18

Just looking for a little bit of advice. Will have had my mortgage with Nationwide for 1 year in June also going off on maternity leave in July. Has anyone had any dealings with Nationwide on procedures to apply for mortgage break - fees /credit scores etc.

We bought new build property at 90% LTV in first phase development. Same properties are selling over what we paid so would be 80% ltv - would Nationwide want survey done?

Thanks

Dan_Collins_2

If you have paid your mortgage for 12 months or more they will let you have two breaks of up too 12 months during the mortgage life. Call your local branch and they can sort it for you and give you all the facts and figures.

Reds-on-Sea

wow, I never knew anything like this! - how helpful!

Reds-on-Sea

Is this only for maternity leave?

Could people who are struggling to pay their mortgages take a 12 month break to save and get themselves back on track?

Does this only apply to nationwide?

thanks

dunstonh

Basically, it's authorised arrears. Some lenders allow it on some of their mortgage products. Some require you to have made overpayments first. It really depends on the mortgage and lender you have.

It isnt something you should do lightly. Whilst mortgage holidays are currently not viewed as negatives at consumer level, mortgage books with high proportions of mortgage holidays being used are considered higher risk at commercial level. As the credit crunch has made higher risk lending more expensive then you may find in future that people who have taken mortgage holidays could find deals are not as attractive as those that have not. Its only a maybe but if the banks have to rely on borrowing money which insists on high quality lending only then that could eliminate those with mortgage holidays.

Plus, you end up paying more in interest over the remaining term which could be as much as two and half times your monthly payment missed.

Mumolu

We are currently on a mortgage break from Halifax.
We own half our house so our mgage was for around 50k and we have had it for 4 years.
I just phoned up and spoke to them about it. At first I said it was because I was made redundant (also on mat leave but was almost finished) and needed time to look for another job. She told me to put down maternity rather than redundancy because if they think you are in financial hardship they will refuse your application, so this is worth thinking about.
It was really easy, they sent the form within a week or so, I returned it and it was so quick. They also acknowledged receipt of application and told us the payments due when we start paying it again.

Dan_Collins_2

You can use it for whatever reason, Big D is right though, you need to think about it before you do it.

Nationwide are the only lender I know that allow this type of break. If you are in arrears or missed payments in the last 12 months they may not allow it. You can take 12 months and cancel it half way through rather than taking 6 months and then needing more.

maemaesmummy

Northern Rock do (our did) let you have a 6 month break but not sure if you can do more than once etc?

Mumolu

maemaesmummy wrote: »

Northern Rock do (our did) let you have a 6 month break but not sure if you can do more than once etc?

My husband thought about this and seemed to think that if we changed our mortgage provider we could have another if needed, but I'm not sure, does anyone know?

epsilondraconis

I'm not in a position to need a mortgage break, however is there a way of using this to our advantage. Lets assume for arguments sake that the interest rates are likely to continue going up for the next couple of years. Lets also assume that I have a fixed rate mortgage and have two years left to run. I obviously don't want to have to remortgage when the interest rates are at their peak.
If I applied for a mortgage payment holiday for 12 months which was accepted by my lender (assuming maternity and we are with Nationwide), would my fixed rate deal effectively be placed on hold for 12 months and I would enjoy the remainder of my 2 year fixed rate deal in 12 months time?

Icey77

epsilondraconis wrote: »

If I applied for a mortgage payment holiday for 12 months which was accepted by my lender (assuming maternity and we are with Nationwide), would my fixed rate deal effectively be placed on hold for 12 months and I would enjoy the remainder of my 2 year fixed rate deal in 12 months time?

I wouldn't have thought so, fixed rate mortgages usually have a specific end date to them after which you revert to the standard variable mortgage on offer. This caught me out when I got a 4.84% mortgage with A&L - I assumed the 2 years meant 2 years into my mortgage not 2 years from when I got the offer with an end date of 30/6/8 :rolleyes:

I have just arranged my re-mortgage at 6.04% for another 2 years as I am effectively stuck (for the moment) with A&L but that's another story