The survey found many who take out a self-cert mortgage found the product to be inflexible, with 44 per cent believing changes were needed to tailor it more to the self-employed.
With 13 per cent of the UK population now self-employed, BoS said the growth in self-cert would continue and that lenders needed to be more responsive to their customer’s needs.
Charles Haresnape, managing director of BoS, said: “We see self-cert as a very robust area. We have got past the time when it was viewed with some suspicion and as a lender we want to do more in the area.”
The need for flexibility was found to be at the heart of most self-employed individual’s financial dealings, with 50 per cent of those questioned believing flexibility was the most important aspect of a self-cert mortgage, compared to 25 per cent who cited the rate.
BoS said options such as underpaying and overpaying, rather than just fixed monthly payments, should be key aspects of a self-cert mortgage and it revealed it would be offering the option of commercial loans at the same time as a mortgage to help the self-employed manage their finances. It also planned to extend its Personal Choice product into the buy-to-let arena.
David Mead, director at Flexible-mortgage.net, said: “Many self-cert products don’t allow flexibility when it comes to over and underpaying. As a result, those with fluctuating incomes can suffer. If a lender was to promote this in its products, it would receive our full support.”
