Precise Mortgages

Precise Mortgages, the intermediary only lender has launched an exclusive product with Positive Lending offering a refund of valuation fee on all bridging loans.  The details of this exclusive product are:

• Refund of valuation fee up to a maximum of £1500
• Available on all Precise Mortgages’ published bridging rates
• Minimum loan size £250,000

Alan Cleary, Managing Director of Precise Mortgages said, “there isn’t much product innovation in the bridging market so we are testing whether brokers respond positively to product features we routinely offer in the mainstream market.  Positive Lending are a leading packager in the bridging market as well as being one of our top Premier Panel members so it was a natural choice for us to join up on this product.”

Paul McGonigle, Managing Director of Positive Lending added, “We are delighted to be working with Precise Mortgages on this  innovation.  With market leading rates from Precise Mortgages coupled with lower set up fees this will allow clients and brokers to benefit from the most competitive pricing package coupled with market leading commissions from Positive Lending. The market is fierce and product enhancements such as this are welcome and I applaud Precise Mortgages for recognising this.”

Precise Mortgages, the intermediary only lender and Brightstar Financial have joined forces to complete their largest respective bridging loan to date.

The loan, for £15.1 million, was secured against two high-end London properties valued at £22.5 million and was used to repay the existing first charge lender on the borrower’s main residence and to fund the purchase of a second property. Once refurbishment works have been completed the customer intends to move to the new property and sell the current residence; this will, alongside a refinancing to a long term lender, repay the bridging loan.

Due to the exceptionally high credit quality of the loan it was priced at just 0.7% per month with a 1.5% facility fee giving an overall APR of 10.5%.

Alan Cleary, Managing Director of Precise Mortgages said, “there was a lot of competition for this deal so in order to win it we priced aggressively to make it very difficult for other bridging lenders to compete.”

Rob Jupp, CEO of Brightstar Financial added, “This represents one of the largest short term loans originated in the UK for quite a few years. It’s huge testimony to both Brightstar and Precise Mortgages that we concluded this in the manner that we did.”

There has been little product innovation from lenders over the last few years for understandable reasons but in the last few months there has been signs that a return of sorts is arising. Take Barclays launch of a FTB product which links the parents savings to the deposit of the offspring, this is a most welcome development if you are in a position to benefit from it. This was preceded by Aldermore Bank launching a 100% mortgage which uses a charge against a guarantor’s residential property. Recently Scottish Widows Bank has started talking up the benefits of Offset and Professional mortgages and whilst none of these technically qualify as innovations they are nonetheless welcome product developments. At Precise Mortgages we too want to bring out product improvements that help borrowers and brokers and to this end we have introduced Product Cascading. Again it is not a new concept but for those brokers who have not seen this before I will explain; all it means is that once you have entered the borrower’s details into our decision engine the system will present the cheapest products available for that borrower’s risk profile. This works on both our Home Owner range and our BTL range. Precise Mortgages caters for borrowers who do not qualify for a mortgage from a high street lender because they have a credit score that is lower than that required by a high street lender or they have some form of adverse credit history. Our rates for borrowers who just miss out on a high street lenders’ products are unsurprisingly very similar to rates offered on the high street, but should the borrower have missed some payments at some point in the past there is a vast array of product options available to them. This saves the borrower and the broker a lot of time and effort as rather than getting a straight decline there is a chance that another product is available. Of course, like all lenders we sometimes say no, but brokers can be safe in the knowledge that our system will have searched our entire product range and will only decline if we have to. All of this is done literally in an instant as once the borrower’s details have been input it takes just a few short seconds for a decision to be delivered.

Many intermediaries have been surprised that borrowers have been cascaded up into a cheaper product than they expected but this is often explained by the fact that missed payments on unsecured credit are allowed. Remember, the system is designed to always present the cheapest products based on the individual borrower’s circumstances so even if a broker thinks the borrower won’t qualify it is worth inputting their details to see if we can help; and because we only leave a Soft Footprint there is no damage to the borrower’s credit file irrespective of whether the decision is an accept or a decline.

The reason why brokers may find this innovation useful is twofold. Firstly, it creates options for brokers to place cases that they otherwise would not find easy to place and secondly our products and technology are only available to intermediaries. The intermediaries share of the mortgage market has been in decline since 2007 and is now below 50% and this is against a back-drop of the Public’s faith in banks being at an all-time low; but once the MMR changes have taken place in April 2014 far more emphasis will be placed on ensuring borrowers get proper mortgage advice. Intermediaries are best placed to maximize this change as only an intermediary can search out products from multiple lenders and only intermediaries have access to products from specialist lenders like us. I predict that the intermediary mortgage market share will decline again this year but once the MMR is implemented consumer buying habits will start to change.

There are very strong signs that the Funding for Lenders Scheme introduced by the BofE is having a positive effect on lending volumes and as this gathers pace more and more borrowers are likely to want to borrow money. The impact on mortgage rates has been dramatic as we have seen an average of 0.80% come of the price of mortgages in the last six months alone; this will stimulate borrowers to consider remortgaging as there are genuine savings to be made. Also, the cost of owning a property relative to renting continues to get cheaper which in turn will stimulate more housing transactions. 2013 is likely to be the best year the mortgage market has seen in years and I have no doubt that we will start to see more and more lenders spend money on technology and process improvements and this will lead to product innovations and improved service to both borrowers and brokers. We intend to give brokers more and more options so that they in turn can help borrowers buy their own homes or improve their existing property or just lower their mortgage payments.

Unfortunately if you are a mortgage adviser working in a high street bank this may not be the news you want to hear.

Tomorrow, Precise Mortgages the intermediary only lender will launch four exclusive Buy to Let products with rates starting from just 4.44% for selected postcodes in the South of the country.

 Highlights include:

• 2 year Trackers at 75% LTV with rates from 4.44%
• 2 year Fixed rates at 75% LTV with rates from 4.54%
• Maximum loan size increased to £1m
• Rental calculation changed to 125% of pay rate or 5% whichever is the higher
• Refund of valuation on selected products
• No minimum income requirements

The core range of Buy to Let products which have no postcode restrictions in England and Wales will be re-launched in the coming weeks and will include enhanced criteria features and a raft of competitive rates.

 Alan Cleary, Managing Director Precise Mortgages, said, “As the demand for our Buy to Let products increases, we are adding more products to the shelves to give brokers and borrowers more options. Our up and down cascading approach finds the cheapest product for the borrower’s circumstances meaning that if a borrower fails to qualify for the product applied for it doesn’t necessarily mean they will be declined.” 

 Today’s news follows the recent announcement that Precise Mortgages has no minimum income requirements on its core and exclusive Buy to let ranges.