The 36 two and five-year fixed-rate mortgages – available through Yorkshire, Barnsley, Chelsea and Norwich & Peterborough building societies and the group’s intermediary-only lending arm Accord Mortgages – increases the current selection of 95% LTV mortgages by 56%.
The group claims to be the only lender to provide an offset function at 95% LTV, encouraging borrowers to continue and benefit from good savings habits.
The mortgages are an extension of the group’s existing selection of products and do not form part of the Government’s Help to Buy scheme or require any family guarantee. They are available for all home buyers and movers, with access for remortgage customers due to be rolled out in early 2014.
Mortgages with no product fee and £500 cashback on completion also form part of the range.
Chris Pilling, Yorkshire Building Society Group’s chief executive, said: “We are delighted to be launching the largest selection of 95% LTV mortgages available from any lender in the UK and delivering good value for our members at the same time.
“We support the intentions of the Help to Buy Mortgage Guarantee scheme in encouraging more lenders to provide lower deposit mortgages but are able to deliver on its aims without relying on Government support.
“House prices have stabilised and improved recently to make this the right time for us to offer such a wide selection of competitive 95% LTV mortgages and they address the toughest obstacle faced by first-time buyers and some next-time buyers which is raising a big enough deposit.
“Our fundamental role as a building society is to support, in a responsible and prudent way, as many people as possible to achieve their aspirations to buy their own home. We do that day-in and day-out already and our new 95% LTV deals will allow us to help even more first-time buyers.”
The launch follows research into the needs of borrowers with small deposits which showed 88% of first-time buyers believed they will find it difficult to raise a 10% deposit.
It also identified 25% of first-time buyers, home movers and remortgage customers favoured traditional lending outright compared to Help to Buy, with 63% at least considering borrowing direct from a lender among other options.
