Help to Buy is in the top five residential searches for the second month running, while capital raising – debt consolidation’ appeared for the first time. Making up the other places were ‘maximum loan to age’ and ‘self-employed borrowers with one years' accounts’.
The most searched for term in the Knowledge Bank system in December was ‘maximum borrowing’.
Help to Buy is in the top five residential searches for the second month running, while capital raising – debt consolidation’ appeared for the first time. Making up the other places were ‘maximum loan to age’ and ‘self-employed borrowers with one years' accounts’.
Nicola Firth (pictured), chief executive of Knowledge Bank, said: “The year ended largely as it had started with a huge number of searches across the different product areas.
“During 2018 new lenders entered the market but it was product innovation that really was the stand out change.
“With interest rates remaining low, lenders continue to compete on criteria in addition to rate which makes it increasingly difficult for a broker to know who will or won’t accept their client.
“This product growth was coupled over the year with borrowers having increasingly complex property and financial circumstances.
“On average brokers searched on five individual pieces of criteria for each borrower which shows how essential it is for a system to ensure that cases are not sent to lenders who will inevitably turn them down.”
In equity release it was all change for the final month of the year in terms of searches. The top search was to find lenders who would lend to non-borrowing occupiers, while the second most popular search was for those who would lend on Grade 2 listed buildings.
Lenders who offer the highest LTV continue to be the top search in the second charge sector, indicating that there are a good proportion of people still looking for maximum borrowing. The second most searched for criteria in December was for lenders who would consider applicants classed as all benefits with no earned income.
Within the self-build sector, maximum LTV remains the top search for a second month for those looking for self-build mortgages.
Regulated bridging was the top search within the bridging sector for the third time in four months.
