
Government plans to restrict mortgage lending, following the budget changes on 22nd June, could make first time buyer mortgages more difficult to obtain. Click headline to read more.

Government plans to restrict mortgage lending, following the budget changes on 22nd June, could make first time buyer mortgages more difficult to obtain. Click headline to read more.

First time buyer mortgages were a smaller part of overall mortgage sales in April, says the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML), indicating that first time buyer mortgage deals remain hard to obtain.

Mortgage lending in February was up a healthy 12%, following a bout of cold feet (and hands) that kept buyers at home during the January blizzards, the Council of Mortgage Lenders revealed today.
The Chancellor Alistair Darling has announced budget changes removing stamp duty on home purchases up to a value of £250,000. This applies to first time buyers only, but should drive sales of first time buyer mortgages. Stamp duty of 1% currently applies to all homes over £125,000 in value.
As the mortgage market continues to thaw following last year’s ‘ice age’ for mortgage lending, there is further good news for those who may have fallen into mortgage arrears in recent months.
Lenders are more committed than ever to working with debt advisers and mortgage borrowers to ensure that as many people as possible stay in their homes, according to the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML) in its response to the chancellor’s pre-budget report this week.
Are you still a HIPpie? The original flower children of the 1960s have now become a new kind of hippy. Known as the ‘Home Is Pension’ generation, they are factoring the value of their home into their pensions and retirement planning.
There are an estimated 1.3m over-50s depending on equity release from their homes as part of their retirement planning, according to a new report from LV= (the Liverpool Victoria Friendly Society).
When shopping around for life cover, it’s best to ‘start at the end’. While it is never a pleasant task to contemplate our own demise, we must at some stage sit down, take a deep breath, and plan our financial provision for our family when we go. With so many life cover products on the market, tailored to a wide range [...]
















