Zeb:

I am not going to stick my neck out and claim up to date facts and criteria about Halifax but I do use them quite a bit for my own clients and I will have to say that what your adviser has told you seems to be about right and I think that (quite typically) you as the applicant have gone and looked for your own information and have scared yourself by what you have read when it will not be applicable to you in the first place.

To the best of my knowledge the following criteria applies at Halifax.

Must have the mortgage at least 6 months before applying for consent to let. Halifax will honour the remainder of the product on consent to lease with no addtitional charges or fees. If you wish to continue the CTL beyond the duration of the intial product (2/3/5 year tracker/fixed) then they will then switch you onto a new variable rate mortgage which may or may not carry a fee (I can't remember) but the rate will be considerably higher than the current variable rate offered for HVR (3.99% as of May 1st)

From what you are saying, you plan to move to a Buy to Let mortgage once your current product expires so the higher rate will not be applicable to you. Technically it is a bit of a no no to be applying for a residentail mortgage on the basis of advance info but its hardly significant fraud and I am sure 99% of the population have done something of a similar insignificant but illegal nature.

If you have any questions then you can phone the Consent to Lease department and ask a few questions to them anonymously. The number I have is for brokers and financial advisers but I am sure you can get what you want on this number: 0845 600 9026.

I would be curious to know how this one pans out so I would be grateful if you can come back and give some feed back.

So. To answer your questions.

1. Halifax is probably the most amenable but most lenders will allow a consent to lease but you must have served at least 6 months term with the lender and some lenders may charge some quite high fees (sometimes up to £1000 per annum). Average fee is normally £99 per annum

2. Your consent to let is available after 6 months term of a product with Halifax. It makes no difference what rate you have with them or for how long and Halifax will honour the CTL for as long as the product is within its promotions term (fixed or tracker)

3. Unless you have what he has claimed on paper then I think you have little or no chance of a valid complaint being upheld especially as the advice he has given is potentially enough to cause you your own problems with what you want to achieve, but to tell you the truth I don't think he has done anything wrong, other than to advise you to take out a personal loan to qualify for the mortgage. I am not sure that I would use him again as this to me is not good proactice and does not constitute what i would consider sound advice....just a means to an end.

4. Will need to refer this to any new lender you approach. Sometimes they will accept it but wuill want it transferred onto their own letter head which they will charge upwards of £100 to do (I really should pass them my printers name and number)

5. Soke but you will still opay the same amount in fees as a 2 year product and by the time you have just got yourself settled you are going to be looking at a new remortgage again. I would most lijkely advise against it but i can see your reasoning why.

Call the CTL number I gave and speak to the lender directly and see what they say. Perosnally, other than the technicality of fraud, i think that you are ok and it should work out for you...assuming you get accepted for the mortgage :)

Good Luck

Thanks for your reply it really provides me good info. I do not understand why if you google it, there are people saying they were forced to move to a really high interest rate and had to pay lots of fees?

Do you know if HSBC will grant consent to let? they are another possible option for me,

Cheers, Tom

I am not going to stick my neck out and claim up to date facts and criteria about Halifax but I do use them quite a bit for my own clients and I will have to say that what your adviser has told you seems to be about right and I think that (quite typically) you as the applicant have gone and looked for your own information and have scared yourself by what you have read when it will not be applicable to you in the first place.

To the best of my knowledge the following criteria applies at Halifax.

Must have the mortgage at least 6 months before applying for consent to let. Halifax will honour the remainder of the product on consent to lease with no addtitional charges or fees. If you wish to continue the CTL beyond the duration of the intial product (2/3/5 year tracker/fixed) then they will then switch you onto a new variable rate mortgage which may or may not carry a fee (I can't remember) but the rate will be considerably higher than the current variable rate offered for HVR (3.99% as of May 1st)

From what you are saying, you plan to move to a Buy to Let mortgage once your current product expires so the higher rate will not be applicable to you. Technically it is a bit of a no no to be applying for a residentail mortgage on the basis of advance info but its hardly significant fraud and I am sure 99% of the population have done something of a similar insignificant but illegal nature.

If you have any questions then you can phone the Consent to Lease department and ask a few questions to them anonymously. The number I have is for brokers and financial advisers but I am sure you can get what you want on this number: 0845 600 9026.

I would be curious to know how this one pans out so I would be grateful if you can come back and give some feed back.

So. To answer your questions.

1. Halifax is probably the most amenable but most lenders will allow a consent to lease but you must have served at least 6 months term with the lender and some lenders may charge some quite high fees (sometimes up to £1000 per annum). Average fee is normally £99 per annum

2. Your consent to let is available after 6 months term of a product with Halifax. It makes no difference what rate you have with them or for how long and Halifax will honour the CTL for as long as the product is within its promotions term (fixed or tracker)

3. Unless you have what he has claimed on paper then I think you have little or no chance of a valid complaint being upheld especially as the advice he has given is potentially enough to cause you your own problems with what you want to achieve, but to tell you the truth I don't think he has done anything wrong, other than to advise you to take out a personal loan to qualify for the mortgage. I am not sure that I would use him again as this to me is not good proactice and does not constitute what i would consider sound advice....just a means to an end.

4. Will need to refer this to any new lender you approach. Sometimes they will accept it but wuill want it transferred onto their own letter head which they will charge upwards of £100 to do (I really should pass them my printers name and number)

5. Soke but you will still opay the same amount in fees as a 2 year product and by the time you have just got yourself settled you are going to be looking at a new remortgage again. I would most lijkely advise against it but i can see your reasoning why.

Call the CTL number I gave and speak to the lender directly and see what they say. Perosnally, other than the technicality of fraud, i think that you are ok and it should work out for you...assuming you get accepted for the mortgage :)

Good Luck

I have a situation.

I have found a nice little house. It is in an area I like and it is 10 grand less than what it should be as it needs redecorating.

I have hit a bit of a snag.

My partner is moving to be here in six months, but she is in council house and is doing swap and doesn't want to lose her right to buy.

So I said that after living in my house for 6 months or a year I'd move into hers and rent mine out.

I made this very clear to my mortgage advisor. Initially he told me not to worry and that everyone rents their house on a residential mortgage. I told him I was not comfortable with this as my job is fraud investigation and if I got caught I would lose my job.

So I really wanted a provider that was likely to give me consent to let for a year and then at the end of the 2 years of the fixed rate I would be able to switch to a buy to let mortgage if I had to and my partner and I could buy her council house.

So my mortgage advisor couldn't get me a loan with the 10% deposit I had but told me he could get me one with Halifax for 15% and he advised me to get a loan from my bank, which I agreed to go for, as if I incorporated a car loan into it, it would work at still cheaper than my monthly outgoing renting.

So I specifically said, so Halifax will definitely be ok about giving me consent to let if I need it and he said yes, and once again told me not to bother and just rent it out anyway.

I asked how long I'd have to live there before I could apply for consent and he said 6 months or a year, which suited me perfectly, as then I could rent for a year then switch to BTL.

Now I looked online and see that Halifax are forcing all their customers who apply for consent to switch to an extremely expensive package, with interest rate hikes and massive fees on top - as far as I can tell it's more expensive than BTL even.

I paid for the survey and his arrangement fee, which was £800 all together.

I feel like I can't complain as I am probably not supposed to be buying with knowledge I may have to rent for a year.

I'd prefer not to receive any judgemental posts about morals/lack of, as to be honest all I'm trying to do is provide some security for me and my kid and I'm far from rich.

My 5 questions are:

Which mortgage providers are likely to give consent to let at a reasonable rate?

Can I even get consent to let while I am on a fixed rate product?

Have I got grounds for a complaint against the mortgage provider? (I may not want to as he works inside the estate agent I am using)

Can I use the survey from my Halifax mortgage for a different mortgage application, or will they insist on their own?

Does anyone do a one year fixed rate mortgage?

This could be my only chancve in my life to get on the property ladder, so any help would be invaluable to me

Kind Regards

Tom Chadwick

p.s. even if you can only answer one part of my question, please do, as any knowledge I can gain is better than the nothing I seem to be able to find at the moment.