Non-porting “portable” mortgages

It is important to read the small print when paying extra for a so-called portable mortgage – often it will turn out not to be portable after all.

Clients of ours are moving to Kent from another part of the country. They are selling their existing house for the same price as they are paying for their new one, both are valued the same, and they want to borrow the same amount: should be perfectly portable, right? Wrong, apparently. The lender is doing its utmost to avoid issuing a mortgage offer, citing a string of increasingly ridiculous requirements and problems – we suspect that, in the current market, they are regretting their original decision to lend, and trying to wriggle out of porting it.

The buyer is losing all patience and will withdraw if we do not exchange contracts on Monday.

In the circumstances, the clients would be willing to sell without buying – living with parents until the lender sorts itself out – but cannot afford to, because of the swingeing early redemption penalty they would be charged, despite the fact that they do not want to redeem the mortgage, but to port it.

As a last attempt, we have asked the lender to waive the early redemption penalty – we will Tweet the outcome, and the name of the lender