It’s the holiday period… but be wary of how you spend, if you’re planning to change mortgages soon.

The holiday period is most definitely in full swing and it’s precisely why I feel the need to be a pain and reiterate that whatever is spent on credit cards has to be repaid!  If you are looking to review your mortgage in the next few months and load the credit card during the holiday period, remember that lenders will use the balance and offset against your income, before working out what you can borrow. That includes interest free credit cards, loans, HP agreements and student loans. They are all taken into account.

The holiday period can also be a time when many people do one of three things in the mortgage sector. Firstly, they start looking at new properties to move to. Or they may already be committed and are packing ready for the removal lorry.  Or they take time to review what mortgage they have and question if there is anything better out there. That is of course, if they are not simply taking a holiday, and why not?

Certainly, once the holiday is over, then it makes sense to review the current mortgage deal and see if there is a better option and perhaps look to secure a competitive rate for a few years. Whilst I always err on the optimistic side of a rates argument, we are entering a truly unknown era.  Boris is now steering ‘UK PLC’ and we have never left Europe before, so there is no history to prompt what the immediate and longer term implications will be.

Therefore, take the chance to look and see if a re-mortgage to a medium to long term fixed rate might benefit you.  There are millions of people on lenders standard variable rates enjoying complete and deafening silence from their current mortgage lender.  Why the silence?  Simply because lenders are comfortable with you paying over the odds and expanding their margins! They are under no obligation to offer you a better deal when you come to the end of an incentive term and you automatically flip onto their standard variable rate. It is always worth looking for a better deal and many lenders will welcome you with free valuation and legal initiatives and a difference of 1% can save you a substantial sum over a few years.  And that might just be a nice contribution towards your next holiday!