It can be a headache searching for the right mortgage. There are over 8500 mortgages on the market so it’s a tricky business. You might conduct a mortgage search on the internet, or via a large high street lender, or with a mortgage broker or advisor. Mortgage advisor can range from single individuals to large organisations with a number of advisors.

When you do conduct a mortgage search you will be asked a number of set questions. These are designed to help you and the lender, broker or advisor with you to find the mortgage that will be best suited to you and your circumstances.

In your mortgage search you will be asked whether you are a first-time buyer, whether you are moving home, or whether you are remortgaging your current home. Mortgages applicable to these circumstances can be very different. You will be asked about your income details; these may applicable to you as an individual, to the higher earner of a couple, or to a couple’s joint earnings. Multiples of earnings are used to determine what you might be able to borrow and 3.5 times the main salary is a standard amount.

When you carry out your mortgage search you will be asked about the property that you wish to mortgage. The lender will want to know its location and its value – you will need a proper valuation before you are lent the money for the mortgage.

These days there are crucial questions to answer in a mortgage search about what kind of mortgage you would like. There are a lot of different types, such as fixed, trackers, discounts, capped. Most are variable rates, but nowadays over 75% of mortgages issued are fixed rates, as people try and escape the variations that come with changes in the Bank of England’s base rate.

Another significant question in a mortgage search these days is concerning bad credit history and county court judgements. With recent problems surrounding sub-prime mortgages (those given to people with poor credit histories or exceptional circumstances) mortgage lenders are becoming more stringent than ever when before they lend money to people.

Depending on the answers you give to these questions your mortgage search will reveal a number of mortgages that are suitable for you. There is less choice in some circumstances – for example those with CCJs – and in those circumstances the mortgage applicant will probably end up paying a higher interest rate for their mortgage.

When you carry out a mortgage search with your advisor – wherever he/ she is from – you should be as honest as possible, as economies with the truth will only lead to difficulties further down the line, and that includes being honest with yourself about how much you can afford to borrow – and pay back.

It is probably wisest to carry out a mortgage search with a broker or an advisor as these people have access to the whole of the mortgage market, and they are doing it regularly so they know what’s available. In this way you will avoid a mortgage search restricted to just a few products (as from a high street lender) and you will not get caught up in a maze of confusion (possible if you did it yourself).

This entry was posted on October 18, 2007 at 3:57 am and is filed under UK Mortgage Listing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.