Life after Northern Rock - and as an ex-pat to boot..

SwissBagLady

My 5.19% fixed rate deal with NR ends on 30.06.2008, and I am on the gruelling search for an alternative to the £1154 monthly payment they are offering on their SVR.

Since taking out the mortgage I have relocated with my job to Switzerland, so in addition to the tightened lending criteria of most lenders, I am also at a disadvantage due to the fact that I am no longer resident in the UK, and the property is now rented and as such I can only be considered for a buy-to-let mortgage.

The only lender who my broker advised me was willing to consider my application, turned me down yesterday. My broker now advises me that I am best to stick with the SVR from NR and wait and see what happens with the rates over the next few months.

The alternative, is to try and get a mortgage from a Swiss bank for the UK property (my Swiss bank is UBS - yes I really lucked out with my choice of financial institutions didn't I?).

Does anyone know whether this is a possibility?

Can anyone offer me any advise?

Thanks

Rick62

Who turned you down - was it an international bank, and do you know why?

What you need is an international bank (or division). In some cases we can actually get better rates than domestic BTL morgages, including Trackers at just 1% over base.

mr_mortgage

Not sure if it's entirely applicable to you ...

PS. I've no affiliation to this company, but thought the article might be of some use.

luckyfool

Bank of Scotland International, as well as the offshore arms of HSBC/Barclays etc will all consider BTL's for ex pats.

e.g. Bank of Scotland offer a Term tracker for 1.25% above base giving a payrate of 6.25% to 75% and for loan amounts of between £250k to £1 million.

SwissBagLady

It was actually Skipton BS who turned me down due to me scoring badly on their internal credit scoring system, and was told this was possibly due to me living abroad.

A further problem is that since the mortgage rate rises, the rent will not cover the repayments so I will have to top-slice payments from my personal income

I have now heard from UBS who say it is not possible through them.

I would have thought UBS was classed as international? Who else would you suggest I approach

Thanks for the advice so far

Rick62

Can you cover the payments based on your income, rather than the rent? Many of the international divisions look at your income rather than the rental income.

SwissBagLady

luckyfool wrote: »

Bank of Scotland International, as well as the offshore arms of HSBC/Barclays etc will all consider BTL's for ex pats.

e.g. Bank of Scotland offer a Term tracker for 1.25% above base giving a payrate of 6.25% to 75% and for loan amounts of between £250k to £1 million.

Thanks,

I will look into these

SwissBagLady

Rick62 wrote: »

Can you cover the payments based on your income, rather than the rent? Many of the international divisions look at your income rather than the rental income.

yes, I can cover the payments based on my income. Is there somewhere that I can search these international divisions online?

Johnk1

SwissBagLady wrote: »

My 5.19% fixed rate deal with NR ends on 30.06.2008, and I am on the gruelling search for an alternative to the £1154 monthly payment they are offering on their SVR.

Since taking out the mortgage I have relocated with my job to Switzerland, so in addition to the tightened lending criteria of most lenders, I am also at a disadvantage due to the fact that I am no longer resident in the UK, and the property is now rented and as such I can only be considered for a buy-to-let mortgage.

The only lender who my broker advised me was willing to consider my application, turned me down yesterday. My broker now advises me that I am best to stick with the SVR from NR and wait and see what happens with the rates over the next few months.

The alternative, is to try and get a mortgage from a Swiss bank for the UK property (my Swiss bank is UBS - yes I really lucked out with my choice of financial institutions didn't I?).

Does anyone know whether this is a possibility?

Can anyone offer me any advise?

Thanks

SwissBagLady - let me know how you get on as I am in a spookily similar position. My current BTL fixed rate (5.85%) ends in September and my lender (Chelsea) only has fixed BTL deals at around 7.49% for me to choose from. I also relocated to Switzerland and am worried how my living abroad status will affect an application to an alternative lender.

As mentioned the alternative is to sit on the Chelsea's 7.49 SVR (+ .25% for being a BTL'er!) and pray for interest rates to go down. The upside to this is I will have the flexibility to overpay or switch lenders without penalty further down the line.

Good luck with your situation.

Conrad

Swiss, I think you will struggle, there are just too many difficult factors for a lender to accept. If you do find a lender, the rate and fees will likely render the remortgage pointless.

I would be inclined to think about selling and putting the money in a high interest account. Some specialist developer accounts pay up to 25%.

SwissBagLady

Johnk1 wrote: »

SwissBagLady - let me know how you get on as I am in a spookily similar position. My current BTL fixed rate (5.85%) ends in September and my lender (Chelsea) only has fixed BTL deals at around 7.49% for me to choose from. I also relocated to Switzerland and am worried how my living abroad status will affect an application to an alternative lender.

As mentioned the alternative is to sit on the Chelsea's 7.49 SVR (+ .25% for being a BTL'er!) and pray for interest rates to go down. The upside to this is I will have the flexibility to overpay or switch lenders without penalty further down the line.

Good luck with your situation.

Thanks John

It seems that I may have found a solution - Rick62 and Luckyfool seem to be on to something. Have investigated and found most international branches of the main high street banks are offering offshore mortgages aimed specifically at ex-pats like ourselves. Have been quoted 1.25% above BOE base rate tracker for the life of the loan - initial rate 6.25%. Nothing is confirmed yet, but is sounding positive so far.

Good luck!