Fifty Nine Financial Limited

Merry Christmas one and all! 🎅🏼 🎄 I hope you all have a great time with your friends and families over the festive period.
Here’s to a big 2019 for us all 🥂
Gav Burrows

Contractor mortgages – it’s a common misconception that it’s hard to get a mortgage as a contractor.
As we see an increase in the contractor workforces across the country, the demand for contractor mortgages also rises. The aerospace, IT, and rail industries employ contractors in huge numbers. Rolls Royce and Bombardier are a classic example of companies who’s contractors I help.
Contractor mortgages are more complex but thankfully it’s an area that I specialise in. I’ve had ...many contractor clients who have been advised previously that they wouldn’t be able to get a mortgage. It leaves them feeling very disappointed. Also, the reality is that contractors are not accepted by all mortgage lenders. This often leaves people with the idea that they can’t get a mortgage for the sole reason that they are a contractor. This is simply not true and highlights the requirement of an expert mortgage broker (that’s where I come in).
Criteria between mortgage lenders does vary a lot. However, contractor mortgages do tend to have some similar requirements as a rule:
- Does the applicant have previous experience in a similar job role/industry – either permanent or contracting
- Do they have an actual contract with a day/hourly rate and set contract term ie 12 or 6 months
- Is there at least 50% of the original contract term remaining – ie 6 months remaining on a 12 month contract etc
Assuming these points are satisfactory then we can look to get things moving. There is a select group of lenders that offer mortgages to applicants that fit this mould. This provides the solution to contractors that are in need of a mortgage.
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Contractor mortgages – it's a common misconception that it’s hard to get a mortgage for a contractor.
As we see an increase in the contractor workforces across the country, the demand for contractor mortgages also rises. The aerospace, IT, and rail industries employ contractors in huge numbers. Rolls Royce and Bombardier are a classic example of companies who’s contractors I help.
Criteria between mortgage lenders does vary a lot. However contractor mortgages do tend to have ...some similar requirements as a rule:
- Previous experience in a similar job role/industry – either permanent or contracting
- Do they have an actual contract with a day/hourly rate and set contract term ie 12 or 6 months
- Is there at least 50% of the original contract term remaining, ie 6 months remaining on a 12 month contract etc
Read more about contractor mortgages on the link below:
https://gbonlinemortgages.com/contractor- mortgages/
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It's becoming increasingly common that I speak to clients who have a mortgage where their fixed rate deal ran out months ago. Sometimes years ago. As a result the mortgage has been moved onto a standard variable rate which means much higher monthly interest payments.
If you're in this situation there is a very good chance that you could be on a much better deal. Standard variable rates (SVR) are typically well over 4%, some 5% upwards. Today I helped a client who had a buy t...o let mortgage that was on a variable rate of 4.49%. I switched him onto a new deal with a fixed rate at 1.79% - this has reduced his monthly mortgage payment from £650 to £259 per month! (£174,000 interest only mortgage). That's going to save him over £9,000 in interest over the next 2 years.
My client was absolutely over the moon.
If you have a mortgage and your fixed deal has expired then you are likely to be paying way more than you need to be in interest.
Get in touch and I'll be happy to help you.
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My latest blog post is all about the guys from the well known Instagram account @our1930sfixerupper - I recently helped them with a remortgage to release equity in the property to fund the remaining renovation work on their home in Reading. 🤓

Using your company profit for mortgage affordability rather than just your personal salary and dividends can make a huge impact on the amount you could borrow.
If you're a limited company director you may be able to get a bigger mortgage than you first thought.
Read more...
... https://gbonlinemortgages.com/company-pro fit-self-employed…/
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A large part of the work I do on a day to day basis is supporting commercial finance deals by providing the required life insurance for the client. If a client has any pre existing health issues it can make things a little tricky. However specialist insurers are there to provide cover for people with a range of existing conditions from high BMI to diabetics.
Read more- https://gbonlinemortgages.com/specialist- life-insurance-di…/

Buying your first house can be quite a daunting thought. If you'd like to get on the property ladder but don't really understand how it all works don't worry. I've put together a simple step by step guide to buying your first home.
https://gbonlinemortgages.com/guide-buyin g-your-first-home/

What a nice surprise from some happy clients! 😆🍷

Pleased to announce the launch of the new website - GB Online Mortgages.
Specialising in complex case mortgages:
- Bad credit mortgages... - Clearing other debts - Capital raising for other reasons - Self employed mortgages - Buy to let
http://gbonlinemortgages.com
🤓
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What can I do to help you?
When it comes to mortgages, I would say only a small percentage of what I do is what you might regard as a 'straightforward mortgage'. Everyone has their own unique set of circumstances. But these are just some of the example situations that I deal with on a regular basis:
Clients remortgaging for any of the following reasons:
... - People needing money for home improvements so raising the funds from the equity in their property - They may wish to raise capital to consolidate debts; loans, credit cards etc - Releasing capital from a residential property for commercial business purpose - Home owners wanting to use some equity as a deposit to buy another property, some land, or any other legal purpose
Other common scenarios:
- Adverse credit mortgages for clients with a poor credit history; defaults, CCJ's, bankruptcies etc and people who have been declined in the past - Buy-to-let mortgages, including portfolio landlords - High loan to income ratio mortgages – some specialist lenders can lend up to a maximum 6x salary - Self-employed clients with complicated income
I also look at a wide range of protection solutions for both personal and business including:
- Life & critical illness cover - Income protection - Family income benefit (probably my most popular insurance product for families that most people aren't even aware of!) - Business loan protection - Keyman life & critical illness cover - Shareholder protection - Keyman income protection
*If you've had any of the above insurances in place for 2 years or more it will be worth reviewing them as policies are constantly improving so there will more than likely be a better or cheaper protection solution available for you now.
If you have a scenario like any of the ones mentioned above, or you have existing insurance policies that have been in place for a couple of years or more, get in touch and I'll be more than happy to help you. We can have an initial chat to discuss some options and establish the best way forward.
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Recently I've helped a number of first time buyers get mortgage offers when they had previously been told by other advisors that it wouldn’t be possible for them due to a poor credit history. Some had also had previous applications declined. No doubt there are lots of people out there who are in a similar position that hold similar beliefs - that they wouldn't able to get a mortgage due to defaults, missed payments, CCJ’s, bankruptcy etc that may have happened in the past. Th...is is not necessarily true.
If your credit report is far from perfect then of course you would be right to assume that it does makes things more difficult. But there are often more options than you might think. Everyone’s circumstances are different but as an example I’ve helped clients get mortgages where applicant 1 had defaulted on a credit card last year and his partner had previously been declared bankrupt. They were absolutely convinced that they wouldn’t be able to get a mortgage but a few months later and they now own their own home. In another example case - applicant 1 had a number of historic defaults on credit cards, loans, and utilities. His partner also had a fairly poor credit score. It certainly did not look great. They’d had applications declined previously and been told it wouldn’t be possible yet they came to me and they now have a mortgage offer in place.
The key to mortgages for adverse credit clients is knowing the market place and then placing the case with the right lender in the right way.
The first thing I ask of any client with a poor credit history is to get an up to date copy of your credit report. A quick and free way of doing this is through a website called Noddle. However you can also use Equifax or Experian and they will show you more detail which helps me to see things more clearly. There is also a new service called Checkmyfile that shows the results of all the big credit agencies. All of those services will offer you free access to your credit report for 28 days.
If you have a poor credit history or have been declined a mortgage application in the past, I’m more than happy to have a chat to discuss your options and see if I can help you where others perhaps weren’t able to.
Get in touch with a copy of your credit report and I’ll see what options you have.
https://gbonlinemortgages.com/poor-credit -first-time-buyers/
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Although credit cards can be a very helpful source of credit when managed correctly, they are also a unique kind of debt in that there is never a structured payment system in place to ensure that the borrower can eventually clear that debt in an affordable way. It’s far from uncommon for people to accumulate large credit card balances that they find themselves unable to clear so they end up only making the minimum monthly payment which is mostly just interest. The result of t...
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One of the biggest obstacles with buy to let mortgages now days is rental 'stress testing' that most lenders carry out to establish a minimum required rental figure in order for them to even consider a buy to let mortgage application. In a lot of cases these stress tests make it impossible to get a remortgage on a property that the banks would have previously had no issues with. This can be particularly problematic if you already have a buy to let mortgage and you want to rem...ortgage to a new lender for a lower interest rate. If the rent your property generates is fairly modest in relation to the size of mortgage you have, you could find it rather tricky to get away from your current lender.
Earlier this month I had a prime example of exactly this. A client of mine who has a portfolio was looking to remortgage 2 of his properties. The best interest rate his existing lender could offer him was a whopping 5.09% - this was having a severe impact on my clients profit from these properties. The rent his properties command didn’t fit with any lender that stress test rental figures and it looked like he was trapped. Thankfully having a broad understanding of the buy to let lending market meant I knew exactly where to take these cases. Almost every lender out there handles a BTL application with the same stress testing approach as I mention above. But there is a lender that doesn’t work that way and assesses BTL applications on a pure affordability basis. Something that had previously looked impossible turned out to be a fairly stress free application and I was able to secure the 2 mortgage offers this week. The new deals are 3.09% fixed for 3 years. The financial benefit of this for my client is huge:
The combined debt of both mortgages is £237,000. At 5.09% he would have paid £36,189 in interest over the next 3 years. At 3.09% he will now pay £21,969 over the next 3 years.
These 2 remortgages will save my client around £14,220 in interest payments over the next 3 years. Needless to say he is extremely pleased with the outcome.
If you’d like to discuss your mortgage requirements, no matter how complex you may think the situation is, get in touch and we can have a chat.
https://gbonlinemortgages.com/buy-to-let- mortgage-happy-cl…/
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Always nice to read the testimonials I get. This one landed in the post this morning and I thought I’d share it as I was particularly pleased when I read it.

I'm seeing more and more clients that don't know what their sick pay arrangements are with the company they work for along with self employed people that have no provision in place if they're unable to work.
Are you fully aware of your company's sick pay policy? For example if you were off sick for the next 6 months would your company pay you your full salary? Maybe only half? Or would you just receive statutory sick pay which is proving to be more common now days. Statutory... sick pay is currently just £89.35 per week. If you were to only receive statutory sick pay how would that effect you and your family's life style?
If you were unable to work long term due to sickness or injury what impact would it have if your total monthly income was £357.40? For most of the people I speak to with families that figure would barely cover the monthly food bill. Also statutory sick pay stops after 28 weeks. After this point you have to apply for employment support allowance which is not easy to get. For this reason I'm very passionate about income protection and the value it can offer people. It's something I always recommend to all of my self employed clients. But even as a permanent employee now days, unless you're part of a large company, not many people will be paid their full salary if you're off work long term with sickness or injury. Most companies will put you on statutory sick pay straight away and even one month of such a reduction in pay can have a catastrophic impact on peoples lives.
There are some really good benefits with the new income protection products on the market now days and the policy would be tailored to suit your personal circumstances. If you don't have any provision in place to protect your income and you'd like to find out more about it get in touch. We can have a chat about your situation and hopefully find you a solution to give you and your family piece of mind. Additionally if you already have a policy that you have had for some time now would be a great time to review that as there may be an improved income protection product available for you now.
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This week has seen a number of mortgage lenders start to increase their interest rates. This may be the beginning of a change of directing for mortgage interest rates. However there are still some fantastic deals out there. So if you're on a standard variable rate at the moment or your existing deal is going to expire soon get in touch and we can look at some options to find you a great remortgage product. It could be a perfect time to move onto a new fixed rate.

Just completed a nice case. My client is a single parent with 2 children. She contacted me to discuss the possibility of consolidating her overdraft debts and her store card. Although month to month she wasn't struggling for money, there is no payment structure in place to help people get out of an overdraft or store card debt. We discussed the options and I've now remortgaged my clients residential property and released some of the equity that she'd built up to allow her to ...pay off these debts. Although this means she is taking those debts over a long time scale with the mortgage, she now has a structure in place to actually clear the debt. Also because her mortgage was on a much higher interest rate previously her monthly payment is now less than it was before. To top it off this was one of the quickest remortgage cases I've ever done - from mortgage application to completion in 17 days. One very happy client. Although this wasn't a particularly large case for me it is extremely rewarding to be able to help someone in this way.
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Case Study from June - residential remortgage raising additional funds to be used for business purpose.
I picked up a new client earlier this year that needed to raise funds to purchase a new commercial property for his business. With a relatively small mortgage on his home he thought it would be ideal if he could simply use some of his equity in his residential property. He did some research himself online and was left convinced that it wasn't going to be possible to raise m...oney to be used for commercial purpose with a residential mortgage. One of my other clients had told him to speak to me and see if I could help. It is true that hardly any mortgage providers will lend money for commercial purpose on a residential mortgage. However there are a couple. What had seemed like it was going to be an impossibility turned into a fairly straightforward remortgage because I knew which lender would welcome his case. Fast forward 6 weeks and my client had purchased the commercial property and his business has since relocated. It's safe to say that he was over the moon.
If you think you have a complex scenario feel free to get in touch to discuss you situation.
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We recently had Gav assist us with finding and setting up the mortgage on our new home. Me and my wife are both very happy with the efficient and helpful service we received. Being self-employed this wasn’t a straight forward mortgage application but Gav made the whole process as fluid as possible, and also managed to secure us a great deal. Thanks again.

Superb advice and excellent service from Gavin

Provided myself with a quick and efficient service and helped save me a decent amount of money in the process, highly recommended!

I would never have got a great mortgage deal without the help of Gavin. He saved me lots of money as well as always being available and quick to respond. I highly recommend him.

Highly recommend Gavin, very proficient & professional at what he does. We will be using his services again.

Helped one of my clients secure a mortgage, great guy, goes the extra mile and always available. Great !!!