Rule of thumb for maximum mortgage for a contractor + permie couple?

[vetran]

It's Sixpence per person per week. She can service quite a few.

Blackadder: [Arthur wants Blackadder to tell him a children's story because he misses his mother] And then Squirry the Squirrel went "Ni, Ni, Ni" and they all went home for tea.
Arthur the Sailor: Thanks very much, me ol' shivering mateys! Now, how much do you charge for a good hard shag?
Blackadder: [nervously] A thousand pounds.
Arthur the Sailor: A thousand pounds? You've got to be joking!
Blackadder: Well, I'm sure we could negotiate.
[Tosses soliciting placard to Baldrick]
Blackadder: [next scene: back at home] Right, so we've got sixpence.

[jamesbrown]

Minor contribution here, but I believe you can now remove/return money within an ISA in the same year, i.e. without impacting your yearly contribution limit, although I'm not sure if all banks have adopted this flexibility. It could provide you with some additional time to sell your mother's place...

[Jess@ContractorFinancials]

Hi d000hg,

It depends on which lender you are approaching - some will only want to see your current contract. Others will want to see your last 12 months/possibly even 24 months and would then look to average your income over this period.

Ideally if you can get a contract that states what you work per week, i.e £500 per day / 5 days per week or £45 per hour, £40 hours per week etc, this would help as the lenders will annualise your income off of this. Some lenders, if days/hours per week are not mentioned will make an assumption of 5 days per week or 37.5 hours per week and will only amend this should your contract state differently.

If you are working less than this (i.e 3 days per week) it is up to your mortgage adviser to ensure the correct documentation is sent to the lender to confirm this and they will need to ensure your case works on affordability on this basis.

A letter from your end client is usually very helpful - although if they could word it as "works a minimum of X hours per week" rather than "up to X hours per week" that will probably work better for you with most lenders

[DimPrawn]

And they say self cert mortgages (liar loans) are consigned to history.

[SneakySimon]

Contractor Mortgage

I got a contractor mortgage last year - it was based off my day rate (£450 at the time) and my CV history (ie showing not gaps).

I spoke to several contractor brokers - at a £450 per day, the amounts they / the banks would lend varied hugely on a 90% mortgage - max was £600k and lowest was £240k.

I went through Halifax who had the best deal, though the amount they offered was close to the amount I needed. They just wanted 3 years company accounts and 3 years self assessments and a copy of my contract - it had to have at the time of exchange, at least a month left to run on it.

Broker I used was FrelancerFinancials - very professional and efficient.

Good luck

After going around a few brokers, I couldn't get a

[PurpleGorilla]

I looked into a contractor mortgage earlier this year.

As I have multiple contracts with multiple clients it had to be based on my accounts (two years at the time). In the end was looking at being able to borrow around £300k, which seemed a bit low all things considered.
I'm hunkering down with the cheap mortgage we've got, and waiting for the Brexit crash to wreck things up nicely.

[d000hg]

Minor contribution here, but I believe you can now remove/return money within an ISA in the same year, i.e. without impacting your yearly contribution limit, although I'm not sure if all banks have adopted this flexibility. It could provide you with some additional time to sell your mother's place...

Yeah I need to look into this but my assumption is you have to pay it back the same tax year and the timing is looking like April will be the worst possible time for the tax year to end

I wonder if renting the place might be an option but I'd understand if the sellers don't want the hassle.

[jamesbrown]

Yeah I need to look into this but my assumption is you have to pay it back the same tax year and the timing is looking like April will be the worst possible time for the tax year to end

I wonder if renting the place might be an option but I'd understand if the sellers don't want the hassle.

There's a brief description here:

https://www.gov.uk/individual-saving...ing-your-money

I think it matches your expectations, i.e. within a tax year, and only for ISAs that are designated "flexible". Of course, whether you're really saving much in ISAs now (vs. regular accounts) is also worth considering, given that interest rates are so low, there's now a Personal Savings Allowance (500 or 1000, depending on your tax status), and the annual ISA allowance is fairly high (so you could replenish it fairly quickly).