Criteria Hub has published the top threesearches made by criteria broker users in residential and buy-to-let mortgages so far in 2018.

The firm says the leading search in the residential category on age limits reinforces evidence of the growing number of cases where older borrowers are looking to seek funding either to raise capital or for new purchases.

In the buy-to-let section, the requirement from lenders for applicants to show an income separate from rental income has meant that brokers have made the search to establish which lenders have a minimum personal income requirement has led it to be Criteria Hub’s primary buy-to-let search. 

Top three residential searches this year are:

1. Age Limits: Maximum Age at End of Mortgage Term
   Indicates the absolute maximum age a lender will lend to. In summary ‘Lender max age at end of mortgage term’ indicates the age a lender could potentially lend up to if you meet all required criteria.
2. Defaults (unsatisfied) potentially accepted
   Indicates if a lender can potentially accept applications from applicants that have had/or have unsatisfied defaults registered against their name
3. Interest only: Sale of mortgaged property
   Specifies whether interest only with the repayment vehicle ‘sale of the mortgaged property’ is an acceptable repayment method on residential mortgages.

Top three buy-to-let searches this year are:

1. Minimum Income Requirement
   Indicates if a lender has a minimum income requirement for buy-to-let applications and if so what it is.
2. Expat buy-to-let
   Indicates if a lender can potentially consider buy-to-let applications from expats.
3. First Time Buyers
   Indicates if a lender can potentially consider applications from first time buyers.

Jason Hegarty, director of Criteria Hub, said: “We are aiming to publish our data on a regular basis because it does illustrate the kind of cases that advisers are working on and the queries to which they need answers. Simple criteria like maximum age limits for residential mortgages and minimum income requirements for buy-to-let cases might not seem important, but the volume of enquiries about the same topic allow us to create a bigger picture of the areas where advisers are seeing the most demand.”