Category: Banks

Landlords taking next steps in Bank of Ireland Case

A few weeks ago we published a post discussing how a group of landlords had been given the go-ahead by a barrister for them to launch a class action against the Bank of Ireland. The landlords are taking the bank to court due to the fact that it has announced it will be increasing the interest rates on its tracker mortgages by around double. Even though not all that are affected by the bank’s decision are landlords, those with buy to let mortgages […]

BM Solutions changes lending criteria for Landlords

A day after the Budget announcement where George Osborne called on banks to increase lending to those involved in the housing sectors it was revealed that BM Solutions decided to loosen its lending criteria for buy-to-let landlords. This comes as good news as recently there have been a number of buy-to-let lenders who have stated that they will no longer offer lending to landlords who have tenants that receive housing benefits such as The Mortgage Works and Lloyds TSB.
Even though The Mortgage Works – […]

Buy-to-Let Mortgage Lenders Shake-Up

It has been a week to remember when it comes to buy-to-let mortgage lenders, as there have been multiple announcements from companies concerning the management and running of their businesses. Firstly, Nationwide has announced that its buy-to-let lending subsidiary The Mortgage Works will no longer be offering mortgages to landlords that have tenants which receive housing benefits.
It is believed that The Mortgage Works is trying to distance itself from landlords with tenants that receive housing benefits due to the fact that as of April […]

Landlords bolstered by interest rate status quo

As the financial sector started to dissect the statement from the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) after its decision to hold the rate at 0.5% for yet another month, landlords with an interest in taking out yet more landlord insurance as they expand their portfolios must have found it hard to suppress a cheer.
The bleak statement accompanying the announcement of no change was based on the disappointing growth figures over the last six months with the MPC admitting the fragility of the […]

Borrowing money to pay the rent is increasing

The housing charity Shelter has revealed that more tenants than ever before are now borrowing on their credit cards just to pay their rent. They reported that more than two million people have used credit cards to pay either their mortgage or rent during the last 12 months, a massive 50% increase on the previous year.
The research involved asking 2,234 people if they had borrowed on their credit card to keep a roof over their heads and 6% said yes, compared to just 4% the […]

Lloyds bounce back

Yet another partly state owned bank has announced profits this week and landlords looking for a bank to provide funds for extending their property portfolio, could be well advised to try Lloyds.
Lloyds Banking Group today posted a half year underlying profit of £1.6 billion in a dramatic reversal of fortune. In the same period last year the bank lost over £3.9 billion. The bank which was rescued by the state and is still partly owned by UK, taxpayers reported good profits from its retail banking […]