Hi, I'm after some advice regarding our mortgage situation. Our 2 year discounted variable rate mortgage with Abbey comes to an end in August and I'm starting to look around at whether it is worthwhile staying with Abbey or moving to another lender.
Abbey have offered the following products to me:
2 Year Fixed at 5.49% - £999 arrangement fee
2 Year Fixed at 5.79% - £499 arrangement fee
2 Year BRT at 0.21% of BofE Rate (therefore 5.29%) - £999 arrangement fee
No other fees apart from early redemption fees and product will kick in as soon as existing product finishes.
I'm debating a few things at the moment:
1 - To me, this sounds like a fairly typical deal amongst the major lenders and will certainly be far less hassle than me having to move elsewhere. Can anyone recommend another product that would be significantly better to warrant the hassle of moving to another lender?
2 - I hate these high arrangement fees that have started to be charged by lenders. Has anyone been able to knock Abbey down on the arrangement fee?
3 - My wife is pregnant with twins at the moment and I'm debating whether to stick with a variable rate again or go with a fixed rate for 2 years to protect our monthly payments with the impending cash drain that will be the new arrivals! So (crystal balls out), what do people think that the rates are likely to rise to as a maximum? I've been stung on my current deal these past 2 years by going with a discounted SVR tracker rather than a fixed rate but I really don't want to lose out on dropping interest rates if I can avoid it over the course of the next two years.
Your collective wisdom is greatly appreciated!