fbpx
9 Reasons to Use a Broker in 2024

9 Reasons to Use a Broker in 2024

Using a mortgage and protection broker can save you time and worry, handling everything from searching for a deal to applying and communicating with the lender on your behalf. In today’s busy world, we could all benefit from having a calmer, more stress-free life, so here are our top 8 reasons for using a broker in 2024…

Michael Coombes James Wright 9 reason to use a mortgage & protection broker Coombes & Wright Mortgage Solutions Hertfordshire

1. Access to Better Deals & Products

Banks and lenders can only access their own products. By contrast, brokers look at a broad range of mortgages and broker-exclusive deals. We have access to over 65 lenders to find suitable products to meet your needs whether you’re a first-time buyer, remortgaging, moving house or a buy-to-let investor.

2. Manage all the Admin and Legwork

The Coombes & Wright team look after the complete mortgage and protection process for you, including all application paperwork and admin, liaising with your lender, solicitors, estate agent or new home builders. This can be daunting and stressful if you’re unfamiliar with all the jargon and processes. Don’t worry. We do all the legwork so you can relax! With advisers across Hertfordshire in Brookmans Park, Potters Bar, St Albans, Hertford and Abbots Langley, plus London, and Dover and Canterbury, Kent. We offer appointments at a time and location to suit you and are available to answer questions and provide advice.

3. More Streamlined, Less Stressful

As brokers, we deal with lenders daily. We know the application process and background criteria for each to ensure you encounter minimal delays.

4. Benefit from Expert Knowledge

Mortgage brokers have expert knowledge of the mortgage and protection market and can recommend deals that suit your personal situation. We access software to search products faster and more thoroughly than you could. We have day-to-day experience with which lenders are most likely to accept you and help you avoid applying for deals you’re unlikely to get (which can negatively impact future applications).

5. You’re Fully Protected

Brokers have a duty of care to recommend suitable mortgage and protection products and must be able to justify our recommendations. You can complain and be compensated if our advice is not up to scratch.

6. Honest Peer-to-Peer 5-Star Reviews

As consumers in 2024, checking out a company’s customer reviews is second nature. We’re incredibly proud to have over 650 5-star reviews across Google, Trust Pilot and Facebook, reassuring you of our commitment to excellent customer service.

7. Industry Experience

We know the industry – Mortgage criteria have tightened massively over the last few years, with arguably the most comprehensive ranges of products on offer. Affordability tests and checking processes are in place to protect consumers but understandably increase application complexity and timescales. That’s why it’s so important to stay in the loop – and to have a broker on your side who understands it all.

8. On Your Side

Brokers are on your side and work for you! We search for the most favourable mortgages and protection products to meet your individual circumstances. We aren’t on the lender’s side. You get unbiased advice and can choose from a range of lenders and subsequent products rather than being restricted to a single range directly from a lender.

9. Fully Qualified

Brokers are qualified – There’s a lot to consider when choosing a mortgage or protection product such as life insurance or income protection. It’s not as simple as just opting for the cheapest deal. Mortgage & protection brokers must be qualified to give you advice.

So, there you have it, our top 8 reasons to use Coombes & Wright Mortgage Solutions for your next mortgage, remortgage or protection product.

Book your free no-obligation initial consultation

Can House Prices Keep Rising?

Can House Prices Keep Rising?

With the Stamp Duty Holiday winding to a close, it’ll soon be time for the housing market to go back to standing on its own two feet.  It’s always managed this pretty well in the past.  Can it keep ploughing ahead now?

The drivers behind house-price growth

Since July 2020, the UK has seen extraordinary house-price growth.  Given the timing, it seems reasonable to assume that the SDLT holiday was a factor in this.  The key question, however, is whether or not it was the only factor.  If it was, then, at a minimum, house-price growth should stop.  If it wasn’t, then house-price growth should continue albeit possibly at a slower rate.

Why were people moving?

Anyone who’s ever moved home knows just how much hassle it involves.  What’s more, even with the SDLT holiday, it’s generally an expensive undertaking.  The SDLT holiday, for example, did not cut the costs of mortgage applications, valuations and conveyancing.  Similarly, it did not cut the costs of physically moving from A to B.

It, therefore, seems fair to assume that the SDLT holiday simply prompted people to get on and do something they were planning on doing anyway.  This raises the question of why they were doing it.

Upsizing and downsizing

If you need more space than you have and can’t extend then moving is really your only option.  If you have more space than you need, then moving can be an attractive option.  Less space generally means less cleaning and maintenance.  It can also mean less cost.

Of course, if you’re really short on space or really have too much of it, you will effectively be forced to move.  If, however, you’re just about managing, then you may need an incentive to go through the hassle of moving home.  The SDLT holiday might have been the boost you needed to get moving.

If this is the case then it’s questionable whether house prices can continue to rise over the near future.  Quite simply, if the majority of people who needed or wanted to move have done so recently, who is going to be buying new houses?  Of course, it’s to be expected that there will be some activity, for example from first-time buyers, but will it be enough to sustain growth?

Changing location

The need to change location might be forced on you or it might be through choice.  In fact, it might even be a bit of both.  This might have been the case for a lot of people in COVID19.  Remote-working became the new normal.  Remote-/hybrid-working is looking increasingly likely to be the new frontier of knowledge work.  That has serious implications for the housing market.

Although some employers have spoken out against remote working, many others are interested in it.  They may not be prepared to go 100% remote (although some companies are).  They may, however, be perfectly happy to switch to a hybrid model.  This allows employers to reduce the cost of office space while still maintaining a base for meetings and collaborative work.

It also allows employees to move further away from their work location if they wish.  In fact, it may strongly motivate them to do so to get the space for proper home offices.  If this is the case then demand may continue after the SDLT holiday ends.  Some employees may have been waiting to see what their employer’s long-term policy would be before committing.

Investing

People buying second (or subsequent) homes still had to pay the surcharge but they qualified for the main SDLT holiday.  If this was one of the drivers behind the price rises then it’s questionable whether or not price growth will continue.

Investors need to make their numbers add up.  It’s hard to see how they can make suitable returns buying houses at high prices without the benefit of the SDLT holiday to offset them.

Please contact us for mortgage advice.

Think carefully before securing other debts against your home. Your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage

What Has The Pandemic Done To The Housing Market?

What Has The Pandemic Done To The Housing Market?

Last year wasn’t exactly filled with fun for everyone but some sectors definitely weathered it better than others.  So far, housing has been one of them.  Here’s a quick look at how the pandemic has changed the housing sector and what that could mean for the future.

Real estate is going virtual

Real estate has been very slow to adapt to the virtual world.  Prior to the pandemic, it didn’t even make the most of the sales and marketing opportunities offered by the internet.  For all the online portals became the place to start looking for a home, they were essentially just digital versions of the old classified adverts.

The pandemic forced the industry to adapt.  It also forced regulators to let it.  One of the major reasons why the property market used such archaic processes was because regulators had concerns about digital security.  These were and are valid but they overlooked the fact that the existing processes also had security vulnerabilities.

Now both the industry and the regulators have had a taste of going fully virtual.  This is not looking very likely to be the way of the immediate future.  It is, however, looking increasingly likely that the property market will adopt a hybrid working model.  This could reduce costs and increase efficiency, thus benefiting everyone.

Business is booming for mortgage lenders

The phrase “rollercoaster ride” is a major cliche but it’s really the only fair way to describe the mortgage-lending market over the last year.  When the first lockdown hit, mortgage lenders were classed as non-essential and forced to close.  Then they had to figure out a way to operate under the restrictions imposed due to COVID19.

Then they had to work out their level of appetite for lending during the pandemic (and with Brexit rumbling along in the background).  Initially, mortgage lenders were, understandably, timid.  To put this in context, there were some very significant barriers to lending.  The most obvious of these was, arguably, the affordability criteria.

In 2020, the issue wasn’t so much the criteria themselves as the challenge of assessing them robustly.  Lenders knew that they could face serious penalties if they were held to be negligent here.  It’s therefore hardly surprising that they generally chose to err on the side of caution.  There was also uncertainty over how the housing market would perform over the long term.  Last but not least, the mortgage lenders had to be particularly cautious about fraud.

Time, however, is renowned for its healing qualities.  Government intervention probably helped too.  In addition to extending the Help to Buy Equity Loan scheme (albeit only for first-time buyers), it relaunched the Help-to-Buy Mortgage-Guarantee scheme.  This created breathing space for lenders to say “yes” where they would otherwise have had to say “no”.

Over recent months, business has been booming for mortgage lenders.  For example, in March 2021, gross mortgage borrowing stood at £35.6bn (according to the Bank of England).  As a sign of confidence, this is encouraging.  It does, however, raise questions about how long such momentum can be sustained and, of course, what happens when it slows.

House prices are going up (and down)

Figures may vary according to who’s measuring them and how.  There is, however, no doubt that overall, house prices in the UK have been on a clear upward trend since July 2020.  As a reminder, that was when the Chancellor introduced the Stamp Duty holiday.

As is often the case, however, overall trends are not necessarily reflected in local markets.  Even when they are, they might not be reflected to the same extent”.  Right now, the biggest demand is clearly for larger properties, the so-called “race for space”.

This means that the big winners are suburbs and satellite towns with at least passable commuter links.  The biggest losers are city centres and established commuter towns.  This trend looks very likely to become established as employers are increasingly showing themselves willing to support remote-/hybrid working.

Think carefully before securing other debts against your home. Your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage

 

Haggle your way to a more affordable home

Haggle your way to a more affordable home

If you don’t like the term “haggling”, think of it as “negotiation”. That’s essentially what it is. In simple terms, the seller (or their agent), is trying to achieve the highest possible price for their home. You are trying to achieve the lowest possible price for the property. This is not about “win/lose”. It’s about reaching an agreement. Here are some tips to help.

Prepare thoroughly

Guide prices are a guide to what a seller (or their agent) wants for the property. You should therefore regard them as sources of information rather than as instructions. What you really need to know is the state of the local market and the seller’s situation. You can find out a lot about the first point with some thorough digging around the internet.

The key point to understand is that you need recent, local data. Recent data tells you what the market is doing now, not what it did in the past. Local data tells you how the market is performing in the locations which interest you. To take an extreme example, there’s no real point in looking up data from London if you want to buy property in Aberdeen.

In fact, if you’re looking at buying in a city, then you want data at local-authority level if not postcode level. Be aware that there can be significant differences in property prices in different areas of a city. You need to be sure that you’re comparing like with like.

Get preapproved for a mortgage

If you need a mortgage, then get preapproved for one. This marks you out as a serious buyer and reassures sellers. Think about whether or not there are any other steps you could take to make a seller’s life easier. For example, can you be flexible with your move date?

Understand the seller

It’s always safer to deal with a seller who has a clear reason to move. This reduces the chances of them pulling out of the sale, leaving you high and dry (and possibly out of pocket). The more motivated a seller is to move, the more chance there is that they will be willing to accept a lower price in return for a quick and convenient sale.

There are, however, a couple of caveats here. Firstly, a seller may have a baseline price below which they cannot, or just will not, go. For example, they may need (or just want) enough to clear their mortgage. Secondly, the more competition there is for a property, the more likely it is that someone else will offer both a higher price and a quick and convenient sale.

Keep a clear head

Until the sale is complete, in fact, arguably until you’ve moved in, you’re buying a property. It may be someone else’s home, but it is not yours. Keep that in mind at all times.

Obviously, you should only be looking at properties where you would be happy to live. You must, however, avoid getting emotionally attached to them. Your attitude needs to be that you want a good deal for your money and will go on looking until you get one.

If any given property is out of your budget (or just overpriced) and the seller is not prepared to reduce the price, then just move on. If you really liked the property, then keep an eye on the listing. If the seller does not get a sale, they might become more flexible on price further down the line.

By the same token, however, be careful about focussing so much on getting a bargain that you lose out on a great property you could have afforded.

Think carefully before securing other debts against your home. Your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage

Please contact us for any more information.

Will Spring Refresh The Property Market?

Will Spring Refresh The Property Market?

Vaccines are being rolled out and spring is rolling in. That’s two reasons for there to be good cheer throughout the UK. Will this mean good cheer for the property market? Here are some factors to consider.

The economy should be reopening

All four parts of the UK have mapped out plans to exit lockdown. Admittedly those plans will depend on circumstances. In principle, there could be halts and even backwards steps before the UK emerges from the pandemic. Overall, however, the general direction of travel should be very clearly towards a post-lockdown “new normal”.

Reopening the economy should have the very practical benefit of improving housing affordability. Of course, it would be unrealistic to expect too much too soon. It’s reasonable to assume that some sectors and job areas will recover more quickly than others. In blunt terms, the less a sector has been hurt, the quicker it will recover.

That said, as sectors recover, the benefits of recovery should begin to spread. For example, as people get their jobs back they will have more disposable income. This can then be spent at other businesses.

People will have clarity on remote working

Companies are going to have to decide whether or not they’re going to support remote working over the long term. This doesn’t necessarily have to mean full-time remote working. Even companies deciding to offer flexible/hybrid working could have a meaningful impact on the housing market.

In simple terms, if remote working goes mainstream, cities and traditional commuter-belt areas could lose their appeal. They could be overtaken by areas where people can afford more space (inside and outside). These areas could have longer commutes, but if people are making them less often this could be an acceptable trade-off.

The Stamp Duty holiday is still on

New buyers might have to more very quickly indeed if they want to get the full benefit of the Stamp Duty holiday. That said, it’s not entirely impossible. If sellers are prepared and conveyancers are available and everything goes smoothly it could be done.

Even if they miss out on the full discount, however, there is still the “consolation prize” of a lower discount available for three months after the main holiday ends. What’s more, if the Chancellor then puts Stamp Duty back as it was, then first-time buyers will still benefit from reduced Stamp Duty after the end of the temporary tax break.

Help to Buy has been extended

This isn’t exactly news, but it’s still relevant. The initial Help to Buy scheme has been extended to counterbalance delays caused by COVID19. The new Help to Buy scheme will be implemented as planned. The government has also outlined an initiative to provide guarantees for 95% mortgages. This is, however, still in the pipeline.

Interest rates remain an open question

The Bank of England advised banks to prepare for the possibility of negative interest rates. Of course, that’s not at all the same as saying that they will actually happen. It is, however, making the point that they cannot be ruled out. Although negative interest rates are not at all a new concept, they would be new to the UK. Hence it’s anyone’s guess what their impact would be.

At the same time, interest-rate increases cannot be ruled out either. Obviously, if interest rates go up, then this could reduce affordability. That said, if interest rates were going up as a result of strong economic growth, the end result could still be positive.

The housing supply is unclear

Buyers need there to be sellers. Currently, it’s unclear how much new-build and existing property will be on the market this spring. Lack of supply could put a damper on the housing market. It could, however, alternatively lead to fewer transactions of higher value.

Your property may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage.

For more mortgage information please contact us