Mortgage advisory firm calls for an end to Mortgage ‘Best Buys’

Email believes that ‘Best Buy’ tables for mortgages are irrelevant to an individual’s needs and often provide consumers with a false picture of the products they are able to access.

Email Mortgages is calling for an end to ‘Best Buys’ and would like to see a focus instead on the consumer’s need for professional mortgage advice to meet their individual needs and circumstances.

Most ‘Best Buy’ tables will include headline rates and some minor information about the product criteria however they are unable to provide full details to the consumer. This means that many consumers may be unaware that, for example, they need a considerable amount of equity or deposit to get the mortgage, or the product comes with substantial fees which will render it too expensive, or the product is only available if the customer lives in a certain region of the country.

Michael White, Chief Executive of Email Mortgages, commented: “Almost every single financial publication available to consumers offers ‘Best Buy’ mortgage tables produced from a variety of sources, including other mortgage brokers. What we would like to know is, who’s buying the ‘Best Buy’ mortgage? We can guarantee that, for the vast majority of consumers, the products detailed in the ‘Best Buys’ are wholly irrelevant and they will have little chance of securing these headline grabbing rates because of the products’ criteria. In our opinion the ‘Best Buys’ do more harm than good in that they provide the consumer with unrealistic expectations of the mortgage they will be able to secure.

“There are many other problems for ‘Best Buys’ including the fact that only partial information is provided - with limited space in the tables the full criteria consumers must meet to secure the mortgage is often omitted. Plus products are often out of date even prior to publication. In this market, lenders change product rates and criteria frequently and the ‘Best Buy’ tables are unable to keep up with a fast-paced market. ‘Best Buy’ tables are merely a marketing tool for those who produce them and they do not help the consumer in their search for mortgage finance. ‘Best Buy’ tables in today’s market are obsolete and we would urge all consumers to take them with a large pinch of salt. Our advice to those seeking mortgage information is not to place too much reliance on the ‘Best Buys’ and rather use the services of a professional mortgage adviser who will be able to provide tailored advice based on their situation.”

Email Mortgages offers fee-free advice from fully-qualified advisers to consumers online via email communication.

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