Why You Should Use A Mortgage Advisor Or Broker

Searching for and buying a new home is a really exciting time. But the process can be confusing and intimidating if you’re not familiar with the jargon, or haven’t been through it yourself. I’ve previously done a three part series for home time buyers on the process, starting from the first three things to do. If you’re wondering whether you should use a mortgage advisor or broker then that’s what today’s post is all about.

Some people make the process look easy, or secure a really great mortgage, but chances are they’ve used a mortgage advisor or broker. We had a mortgage advisor for our house purchase and it was so valuable as it saved us interest and money. And without the right advice and support you may make mistakes, or end up paying more money.

What does a mortgage advisor or broker do?

A mortgage advisor or broker is someone with specialist knowledge of the property market. This enables then to look at a range of mortgage products and work out what best suits your needs depending on your situation. They will then do the hard work for you so the process is as straightforward as possible. This includes assessing how much you’ll get and what you can afford, liaising with lenders on your side, doing the application and all of the post application paperwork.

Having someone else do the heavy lifting means you can spend more time sorting everything else out to do with your move. For us having a mortgage broker took a big strain off from us. And our advisor told us by putting down just a tiny bit more of a deposit we would hit 15% and therefore interest rates for borrowing went down significantly. This meant that over our mortgage term we’ve saved money.

Regardless of whether you’re a first time buyer, or not, you should use a mortgage advisor for peace of mind to get the best deal. They can also help with schemes like Help to Buy or Shared Ownership and guide you towards lenders who deal with this scheme. With my first shared ownership property I found out that not all lenders would lend to shared ownership buyers. Something I wouldn’t have known without my broker.

Why you should use a mortgage advisor

They can save you money

If you were to look at a mortgage for yourself chances are you’d just look for the lowest rates. But this approach doesn’t mean you’ll get the best value deal. A mortgage advisor will look at everything including application fees, interest etc so you’ll get the best value for money in the long run.

You should use a mortgage advisor to save you time

Going through the process of buying a house is time consuming so delegating some of the tasks out is always a smart idea. By using a mortgage advisor or broker you won’t have to spend time researching the market etc. As these people know the market so well they’ll know which lenders to go to first.

A mortgage advisor may have a larger range of product offers

When you look for mortgage products you may only get a limited number of choices. But a mortgage advisor or broker who is connected and knows the market may be able to access and find deals unavailable elsewhere. These deals might be exclusive to brokers.

They’ll chase applications

When you’re buying a house you may spend a large portion of time chasing people up. But with an advisor you won’t have to worry abut the mortgage application as they’ll chase anything for you. If your mortgage application takes some time to come through it can cause further delays and may even mean you miss out on a highly competitive house. Most experienced brokers will know the lenders well and be able to speed them up.

You should use a mortgage advisor as they take care of the paperwork

An advisor or broker will take care of filling in the paperwork for a mortgage and only call on you when they need information, documents or signatures. In some cases this could save you hours of working through papers and information. You may even get pre-filed paperwork where all you need to do is sign your name.

Choosing a mortgage advisor

If you’ve worked out that you should use a mortgage advisor then it’s time to select one. The best way to find out is through word of mouth, perhaps a friend or family member had a good experience with one. We went for an independent advisor who was based with the estate agents we were buying through. This worked out great for us as he had good connections with the whole buying process.

Most mortgage advisors or brokers won’t charge you a fee and instead get a finders fee from whatever lender you go with. But compare rates before settling on a broker.