At the very least, it’s been a great week for bold statements from politicians.

The shadow chancellor George Osbourne has said he’s going to scrap the Financial Services Authority if the Conservatives get into power and the Lib Dem treasury spokesman, Vince Cable,  is calling for the break-up of the new Lloyds Banking Group. So no messing about then, all change next year by the sounds of it.

As you can imagine, this hardly helps to add stability to the mortgage market; after all, if you ran the Lloyds Group you’d probably be looking over your shoulder for the next 18 months whilst making your lending decisions.

However, stability is something we are starting to see (generally) in the market.

Figures show mortgage lending for house purchase was up by 28% in June on the previous three months, while mortgage approvals for house purchase were 13% up in June on the previous three months.

Oh, and did I mention 3 month LIBOR is now 0.94%, which is below one per cent for the first time since it was setup in 1986? And has this had an effect on the pricing of buy to let mortgage products? In a word,NO.

Tip of the week 1:  Free up some cash

Have you got spare capital in one of your properties and would like to get access to it? Well, remember you can still use the technique of the ‘further advance’.

Here’s an example with BM Solutions.

Say you bought a property last year, significantly under what you thought the market value was, and therefore you reasonably believe there is equity in it. As it’s a fixed rate, you don’t want to remortgage due to early redemption penalties however so you can apply for a further advance.

And use this neat trick!

We can determine the market value by getting an online index valuation from BM within minutes, we can then tell you how much cash you can release and what the cost will be.

So, cost to you for this information: zero !

Time spent by you: five minutes!

Give us a call, and we’ll talk you through it. We will just need your BM account number.

Tip of the week 2:  Lender spotlight - Northern Rock

Just thought I would quickly touch upon 3 reasons why people would use Northern Rock (apart from the fact that as taxpayers, we all own them, so were supporting our own business!)

1.         They will remortgage with no minimum period. Just be aware they will remortgage on the original purchase price NOT the current valuation. However, very handy for properties bought for cash/bridging finance where you want money out before the usual six months.

2.         They will look at multiple flats on one title. For example, if you have 2 flats on one freehold title then the good people at NR will lend.

3.         Flexible features - quite rare at the moment for buy to let mortgages. You can make lump sum overpayments and then draw them down when you need them, thereby saving excess interest payments. For example, if you remortgage for £200,000 and need £100,000 this month and £100,000 in 4 months time, then you can immediately pay back £100,000, and draw it down when required.

Call one of our advisors today for more information 01424 205 373