Inform 25th August 2023

As a Society we have a flexible approach to lending that enables us to find solutions for your client’s needs. It can often be a challenge if a client comes to you after a break-up, hoping to keep the home they own with a partner.

Our Rent A Room mortgage (often known as a Lodger mortgage) can improve affordability up to a maximum of 8 x income (subject to criteria) and help them stay in their property.

Current products offer mortgages up to 85% of the purchase price, where you can rent a spare room and have the rental income count towards your mortgage affordability calculations. Find out more, read our FAQs and use our affordability calculator to get an idea of how much they can borrow: https://www.bathbuildingsociety.co.uk/mortgages/browse-mortgages-by-product-type/rent-a-room/

Bath Building Society – Rent A Room mortgage case study

The Rent A Room mortgage allows applicants to let out a room in the house and use the expected income towards affordability calculations.

Ben Rich has wanted to get on the property ladder in his hometown of Bristol for several years. Despite having saved a reasonable deposit, rising property prices in the area meant he was having to consider looking further afield. It’s a familiar scenario today, with young people being priced out of the market, or forced to move away from the area they grew up in, to find more affordable housing.

35-year-old Ben was living with his parents in the family home – a three-bed property in the Henbury area of the city – purchased by his parents in 1995. When the couple decided to retire to the coast earlier this year, Ben approached Bristol-based mortgage brokers Integra to find out if there was any way they could help him and they introduced him to the Bath Building Society Rent A Room mortgage.

The Rent a Room mortgage allows a customer to rent a spare room and use the expected rental income to count towards their mortgage affordability calculations. This was a great opportunity for Ben to stay in Bristol, in the family home and on the property ladder.

As a self-employed carpenter, Ben needed to provide three years of self-employment history. One year was slightly lower as he had purchased a van for the business. Bath Building Society look at each application on a case-by-case basis so were able to be flexible with the affordability calculations. With Ben providing a good deposit and proof of future rental income from renting out a spare room to his friend, the Rent A Room mortgage provided an effective solution at a rate he could afford, to secure the home he wanted.

“It’s a great option that allows you to use rental income from renting a spare room towards mortgage calculation,” said Will Tayton, director at Integra. “We’d recommend the Rent A Room mortgage for anyone in a similar situation who is able to rent out a room to help towards the mortgage payments.”

Notes:

• You can earn up to a threshold of £7,500 a year, tax free, from letting out a furnished room in your home.
• The Rent A Room mortgage currently loans up to £500,000

https://www.bathbuildingsociety.co.uk/mortgages/browse-mortgages-by-product-type/rent-a-room/
For more information: contact Tiffany Hardie Albutt

LEGAL & GENERAL

Protection Success Research – latest content now live. Theme #4 Best Practice

Advisers who are willing to have difficult conversations and risk failure have built resilience around their advice process. Knockbacks or objections don’t dent their confidence or enthusiasm – they believe in the need which naturally moves the feel of the conversation away from selling, and more towards doing the best for their client.

Their confidence is typically built on three elements:

• Real belief – they’re convinced of the value and importance of protection
• Process – they know what works for them when taking a client on the advice journey
• Knowledge – they have an in-depth knowledge of products, the variations, and how it all fits together to meet their client’s needs.

Confidence with passion is persuasive and leads clients to accepting that protection is a crucial part of the picture. It becomes central to any client interaction, whether that’s directly with the adviser, or within the firm.

Turning protection into a ‘buy’, not a ‘sell’

When the adviser sees protection as part of the conversation, the client does too. After all, the client trusts their appointed adviser to give them the best and right advice. They become emotionally invested and are less likely to change their mind or cancel later on.

One adviser we interviewed as part of our research said: “I’ve heard that in the industry, people don’t have the conversation. The starting point is you have to have the conversation. Otherwise there is no sale to be had, and actually it’s immoral not to have the conversation because the client doesn’t know what these things are”.

View our best practise guide or download the full research now

The cost of living crisis has impacted 9 in 10 adults in the UK. Record-high inflation and soaring interest rates have pushed up the prices of everything, from food to heating.

Homeowners are feeling the pinch too, with a surge in monthly bills and complexities for renters, remortgagers and first-time buyers.

Our latest research project explores the real-life impact of the cost of living crisis. We spoke to real people, with real stories on their lived experiences and gathered invaluable feedback.

For brokers, it’s a chance to gain practical insight on how to help clients navigate this challenging time.

The cost of living crisis has caused significant challenges for all kinds of people at all stages of life. An unstable economy has led to homeowners missing bill payments, taking on debt and creating extreme ways to afford life’s essentials.

Living standards are being compromised and people are emotionally and practically squeezed. So, they need our support more than ever.

Read our full report now

Read the latest market insight from Kensington Mortgages’ Capital Markets Director following August’s Bank of England base rate increase.

https://www.kensingtonmortgages.co.uk/intermediaries/k-hub-and-service-levels/blog/read/bank-rate-rises-to-15-year-high

• We don’t require additional information on your client’s existing portfolio or apply an additional stress rate
• For remortgages without capital raising your client can have a maximum of 10* let properties on completion
• Current average time to offer is 10 days and current time passed to underwriting is 1 day for Buy to Let applications

Visit Santander for Intermediaries Website to find out more

At Landbay, we’re your partner in buy-to-let successes. Our range is crafted for brokers like you, delivering solutions for your landlord clients.

From first-time landlords to limited companies, we’ve got it all – even HMOs and MUFBs too. Explore our discounted Limited Edition fixed-rate range, expanded and Remortgage.

Please visit our website or contact your local BDM for full details.

The Kent Reliance limited edition buy to let range features products to suit any property type including HMO and MUFB properties with up to 10 bedrooms/units.

Rate Highlights:

• Suitable for all property types, including HMO and MUFB
• Available up to 75% LTV
• Minimum loan £50k, no maximum loan amount
• Product fee from 2.00%
• Impact pays a 0.45% proc fee for Kent Reliance BTL cases

Limited Edition Product Guide

Take a closer look at Kent’s Limited Edition BTL Product Guide to find a solution for your buy to let cases.

Have a case that you’d like to discuss?

Call Impact Packaging now on 01403 272625

Coventry for intermediaries has launched a new comprehensive guide to help brokers offer extra support to clients looking to purchase a new build home. The guide is a useful tool for first time, and seasoned house buyers, setting off on the sometimes-complex journey to buying a new build property.

The guide contains an interactive house viewing checklist, key questions to ask about the property, step by step guide to securing a mortgage deal, and a comprehensive list of information that should be considered when purchasing a new build.

Ben Williams, Corporate Account Manager from Coventry for intermediaries says “Following the success and the positive feedback we received for our first-time buyer client guide, it has highlighted the importance of providing brokers and their clients with resources specific to each type of buyer or journey.

We know brokers are busy working to get the best outcome for each of their clients. We, therefore, want to support them by providing resources that both they and their clients can benefit from.

Download a copy of the New Build Client Guide here

Too often, it takes brokers and self-employed borrowers a lot of effort and energy to get a mortgage. The self-employed often find themselves in a counter-intuitive place when it comes to getting a mortgage.

Recent figures from the Office of National Statistics revealed that there are 154,000 more self-employed people than this time last year. In total, there are now around 4.4 million self-employed people working in the UK – a figure that includes a significant number of women (an additional 93,000) choosing to work for themselves compared to the same time last year.

What’s more is that almost half of all self-employed working people (48%) in the UK are aged 50 and over, according to ONS data analysed by the over-50s digital community, Rest Less. The proportion of over 50s becoming self-employed has grown year on year for the last decade, despite the Covid-19 pandemic. When we know that complexity is a growing theme of lending generally (multiple income sources are common in many groups of borrowers these days), then the self-employed should enjoy the mortgage lending options available to many other too.

It’s this level of complexity that has historically meant the market has been under-served. The experience of many self-employed people has been one of rejection- not always for good reason – leaving many with the impression that they cannot get a mortgage. And of course, they tell their self-employed friends and the perception spirals.

In theory, self-employed clients are managed through the borrowing process via lenders’ underwriting criteria which means that they should have access to the same range of mortgages as everybody else. Those criteria are the devil in the detail. To qualify for a mortgage, self-employed borrowers will need to exhibit several proof points which can differ from lender to lender.

We cannot speak for everyone but for self-employed borrowers we will accept the latest 2 years accounts or SA302 and tax year overview depending on self-employment type.  Where the trading period is less than 2 years, we can consider 1 year’s accounts. For limited companies, last year’s net profit after tax is considered where the borrower owns 100% of the company (though the last 2 years’ accounts will be required to show stable or improving business profile). We can also accept self-employed contractors or those under an umbrella company structure and accept Day 1 contractors with a minimum of 1 year’s track record within the same line of work.

There are many other elements a lender such as ourselves will also consider. For example, we will consider workers in construction receiving variable payments including CIS as well as those who have zero hours contract with a good track record, second jobs and variable income. We will help recent freelancers with a track record in a similar role.

Good communication between lenders and the brokers is essential in getting the right decision swiftly. Getting a mortgage as a self-employed person shouldn’t take a Herculean effort from either the borrower or the broker. It needs understanding and an appreciation of what is really going on in their business. We might not be able to make it a walk in the park, but neither should it be like climbing Everest.

For more information on how Vida can help your self-employed customers, visit https://www.vidahomeloans.co.uk/ or call the V-Hub team, where you can speak directly to an Underwriter on 03300 246 246.

Don’t miss out on your chance to enter the more2life Flexi Choice competition!

It’s simple, all you have to do is:

• Watch the more2life Flexi Choice webinar
• Answer three simple questions
• And wait…

Both entry conditions need to be completed to be eligible to enter. If you answer all three correctly, you will be entered into a draw to win a £1000 voucher^*

Enter Competition >>

Entries close 9am Monday 28^th August 2023.

Flexi Choice – making the impossible, possible.

^*T&Cs apply

Skilled Worker visa holders are a vital part of the UK’s workforce. Last year the Government recorded that there were 61,240 grants to main applicants of Skilled Worker visas, and an additional 61,414 grants to main applicants of Skilled Worker ‘Health and Care’ visas.

That’s a pretty hefty army of foreign nationals who are contributing to the UK’s economy. We believe in supporting these people in buying their homes in the same way we do our native residents.

Therefore, we’ve reviewed our criteria and made some helpful enhancements to support this vital workforce, as well as British Nationals Overseas. Find out more.