Opinions & blogs

The mutual benefits of professional financial advice

Mutuals have a long history of maintaining a strong presence in the local community...

Longer-term future of buy-to-let market still looking rosy

I’ll be the first to admit that when we ran our latest regular quarterly...

Specialist lenders can help during cost of living crisis

For many millions of people in the UK, these are unprecedented economic times. With...

Mortgage market reviews can always benefit advisers

Boris Johnson’s recent announcement of a new ‘independent review of access to mortgage finance’...

Second charge bridging: fast and flexible funding

The ‘race for space’ that we saw during the Covid-19 pandemic has subsided and...

Working together is crucial to drag conveyancing into the future

While the last few years have been incredibly challenging, one of the positives to...

Making sense of current statistics

Spend long enough at any industry conference and you will inevitably pick up on...

H1 2022: how was it for you?

So, that was the first six months of 2022. How was it for you? I’m...

Rising interest rates – we’ve been expecting you

The reign of the sub-1% base rate is over – for now at least. We...

Personal approach crucial to Consumer Buy-to-let

One of the results of the challenges of the last couple of years has...

The importance of the government mortgage review

When it comes to the recent announcement by the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, of...

The changing face of adviser interaction

Communication is an important part of the mortgage application and indeed the lender-intermediary partnership....

Borrowing into retirement

Borrowing into retirement has become increasingly common in recent years, as the lifestyles and...

Don’t overlook the market for Consumer BTL

The buy-to-let market has evolved considerably over recent years and so have the products...

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Why predicting 2025 interest rates feels like a fool’s errand

In my first (and for some reason clearly not my last) article last month, I attempted (perhaps foolishly) to discuss where rates might go...

Helping university students onto the property ladder

As we head towards the Easter break, thousands of first-year university students up and down the country will be preparing for exams and making...

Lenders must step up on high LTV products

Things are on the up for borrowers with a smaller deposit. The financial information website Moneyfacts publishes a regular update on mortgage product numbers,...

Why it matters that bridging hit more than £10bn last year

We see many numbers bandied around in the financial industry, which can sometimes have a numbing effect. So why should we all, especially brokers, care...

Top five reasons why renters should consider short-term protection insurance

In an unpredictable world, financial security can often feel like a luxury, especially for renters who may already juggle living expenses, rent payments, and...

Latest news

Seven out of 10 homebuyers likely to miss stamp duty deadline

Seven out of 10 (71%) homebuyers with accepted offers expect to miss the 31st...

First-time buyer mortgage sales declined in London over the past decade

First-time buyer mortgage sales in London declined significantly between 2013 and 2023, as increasing...

UTB appoints BDM for the north and Scotland

Fran Arnold has joined the sales team at United Trust Bank Mortgages as business...

International demand for UK property investment ‘more diverse than expected’

The UK property market is attracting investment from a much broader range of international...