For some years, self employed people have been discriminated against when it comes to mortgages. High street lenders have too readily dismissed the self employed as a high risk category and applied rigid criteria to their mortgage applications which has resulted in many 'computer says no' decisions.
Happily there are specialist lenders operating in the marketplace who understand the needs of self employed borrowers. They underwrite each case on an individual basis and some will lend on the basis of just one year's accounts.
As a whole of the market mortgage broker, we have access to lenders who are keen to support self employed borrowers. We are best placed to provide you with the impartial advice you need in order to get the mortgage that's right for you. We will approach the best lender for your circumstances, whether it's on the high street or a specialist.
We can give you advice on all products from every lender across the whole of the market including specialist self employed friendly lenders.
Some specialist lenders will accept only 1 year's accounts regardless of trading period. Some will also accept SA302s for the same period (This is effectively a receipt from HMRC that confirms how much tax you have paid on your earnings).
Our initial advice service is free and without obligation. We'll only charge a fee should you proceed with our mortgage recommendation. We deal with lenders on your behalf throughout the application process until completion.
As a self-employed person you probably know more about good financial practice than many people in 'safe' conventional jobs. You should do, as your livelihood depends on it. Despite this, many high street lenders routinely turn down self employed borrowers, perhaps because they are new in business without three years' accounts, or maybe have had one challenging year which has left them with accounts that don't reflect their whole financial picture.
Fortunately specialist providers are more in tune with the self employed, understand how they operate and look at every case on its own merits, although they do generally ask that you have been self employed for a minimum of twelve months. While it is true to say that in the past the range of mortgages available to the self-employed was limited, there are now more self employed mortgage deals provided by specialist lenders including discounts, fixed rates, offset and flexible products.
Specialist lenders almost exclusively operate through mortgage advisers such as ourselves so whichever kind of borrower you are, a first time buyer, looking to move to your next home, wanting to remortgage, a buy to let investor or have a poor credit history, it pays to seek mortgage advice from us.
There are now over 4.8 million self employed individuals in the UK, accounting for just over 15% of the working population, according to figures from the Office of National Statistics (2017 report).
There has been a 53% rise in self employment since 2000 and 60% of the growth in self employment since 2008/09 has been in high skilled, higher paying sectors.
A number of lenders have now woken up to the fact that Britain's growing legion of self employed company directors, sole traders and contractors make perfectly good borrowers. It could be a long, painful and costly journey trying to find a lender on the high street but with a specialist lender your chances are much better.
As a mortgage broker we'll research the market to find the right lender for you and in some cases we have direct access to underwriters to help minimise the chances of making an application to a lender that is unlikely to be able to help