Can I get a mortgage whilst living overseas and what is needed?

Hello and thanks for reading this article. Or starting to read it, at least! Whether you stay to the end depends on the quality of the contents…?

Today I thought we would look at the one of the most common things we get asked about, on a daily basis! Mortgages…. Can I get one? Is it difficult? I’m overseas and my bank in the UK told me to bu@@er off! What can I do? Can I re-mortgage? And more.?

Therefore, I thought it might be an idea to write up a conversation I had a with a UK mortgage expert recently, where we looked at some of these FAQs. Thanks to Rebecca Pickard of Liquid Expat mortgages for the call, your time, and sharing your knowledge.?

CW - Rebecca, how are you? Can you can you give us a little bit of a background to yourself and maybe a little bit of background to liquid expat and what you guys do?

RP - Yes, of course. So firstly, thank you for having me on today.?

I pretty much have been in mortgages right out of university. Initially, I was based out of the UK and very much focused on helping people living and working in the UK.?

And then about three and a half years ago, my husband got a job opportunity here in Hong Kong. So we decided to relocate, which is when I connected with liquid expat and thankfully they wanted to set up the Hong Kong office - I relocated with them in September 2018 and help set up the Hong Kong office!?

Liquid expat have been in the mortgage space for 15 years, and they decided that rather than helping people living and working in the UK, because there are so many options for those people already, they were going to specialise in the expat space because there just wasn't really a huge amount of knowledge in expat mortgages at that point in time.

We specialise in helping both expats and foreign nationals who have either already got properties in the UK and maybe relocated like myself and want to remortgage or for people who are looking to invest and start to build a property portfolio. We very much have worked on building up a huge number of lenders who are able to help people in this space and who can start to build mortgage options for people who are living overseas.

CW - Let's let's jump in! First question is, what size deposit do I need??

RP - That's the biggest question that I get.?

And that's probably the bit that differs a little bit from someone living and working in the UK. Typically, lenders will ask for anywhere between 20 and 30% as a minimum deposit with the bulk of lenders becoming available when you have a 25% deposit. So, it is feasible, and that being said, if you do have a bigger deposit, always let us know, because it could mean lower rates.

Or it could open up different lenders on the market that maybe have a more suitable product, but as a bare minimum, ideally 25% will give you access to the broadest range of lenders.?

We work with over 50 coming upon 55/56 different lenders now. Each individual circumstance we'll look at and make sure that we're putting the right lender in the right products as well with each client.?

CW – Brill – thanks for that. Can I actually get a mortgage? Another common question we get is – “I went into Natwest over Christmas when I was at home and said I want to buy a house, and I'm now living overseas - can I get a mortgage? They said no, no way. Because you're overseas.?

RP - Absolutely. That is one of the most common questions that I get. And I completely understand it to be honest, because when I worked in the UK, I was that person in your local branch!! Saying “Sorry, we can't help”.?

If you are dealing with people that live or work in the UK, you just wouldn't usually use smaller banks or building societies and so you don't know as much about them. That's where liquid expat are great because we specialise in this area. We spend the time doing the research, building the relationships with these smaller building societies and so we immediately know who can help - we don't go into the bigger high street banks that we know will immediately say no.

And the fact that we do have such a wide range of lenders means that regardless of scenario 99.9% of the time, we'll have somebody who can help each one.

And I guess just a little plug is that because we've got access to so many it does mean that with a few of them we've actually got exclusives and slightly lower rates than available if you go to somebody else or you go to them directly.

CW - Third and final question;

I've already got a mortgage, but I'm paying 4.2%. Or I'm paying 3.5% What can I do? Can I get a better rate??

RP - So that tends to happen a lot with people who have maybe bought property where they will live in a property and they've either reverted to the lender standard variable rate, which is automatically a lot higher, or they've got ‘consent to let’ and a lot of lenders in the UK automatically put an extra percent on when you change to ‘consent to let’ which means paying a much higher rate than they need to. So absolutely, it's always worth having a chat with us at that point in time because I would say 95% of the time we can absolutely get a lower rate. The rates that we have on offer start from 2.59% - so there's quite a big drop there for compared to a standard variable which can be over 4%.

Obviously, that does depend a little bit on you know, the person we're speaking to, income, the property itself, but as I say 95% of the time, there is definitely a better rate out there.

CW -?What's the paperwork and what's the process??

RP – The process and the paperwork is probably the bit that is it is a little bit more difficult when you live overseas. There's there's no getting around it!?

But again, that's where we come in, you know we will try and take as much of the difficulty out of that as we possibly can. We work with mortgages day in and day out. So if we know that they're (a lender) always likely to ask for an additional bit that they don't maybe ask for up front. We'll get it up front from you and try and minimise the stress and the questions throughout the process.?

The main documents that are required and of course this will be different for each person but the main ones are proof of name and address. That’s your passport and utility bill something like that, income, so payslips or if you're self employed, tax returns, bank statements and then proof of deposit and if it's a re-mortgage, then that one's irrelevant as your deposits in the property already.?

Don’t be surprised if they want more info, they will ask for up to six months worth of bank statements sometimes. So it's just worth being prepared. That is probably a lot of downloading PDFs and saving them and then sending them over. It's frustrating but it will be worth it in the end!

There we have it! Some common mortgage FAQs on the process, rates and whats needed! If you would like any more information on the above then please get in touch.?

Thanks, Callum?

Youtube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/c/APWPropertyUK?

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About Me;

I started working in property in the UK, managing property conversions, focusing on redeveloping and modernising Victorian city centre properties to create multiple flats within a property. Adding value and then selling on. My interest in property grew and after purchasing my first buy to let, and I decided to help others do the same.

I have helped people in Asia, Europe, and the Middle East realise this. My specialty is creating income through property, and ‘property for pensions’ and long term wealth creation. Using vehicles such as Buy to Let, off-plan, distressed property, HMO’s and auctioned property. Focusing on defining a clear property strategy to reach goals.?

I aim to make things easy for my clients, offering a friendly face and thought out, research backed advice based on my experience, those of my clients and those of our company.