If your equity release scheme is a few, or many years old, it is worthwhile now to review it and see whether you could save money by changing equity release schemes and obtaining a more favourable equity release deal. The main reasons are that interest rates have fallen from the heights of over 8% to today’s lowest ever level of just 5.57% with the Aviva Flexible Lifetime Mortgage Plan. Couple this with a free valuation and upto £1000 cashback and it makes the process of switching plans very cost effective. By removing 1% or even upto 3% off your current interest rate, could save your estate £1000s in compounded interest over the long term.

The exclusive switch plans tool on this site will compare on a like-for-like basis how long it would take to break even before you break into profit. It will accept details of the original equity release plan including the current interest rate, any early repayment charges and compare to a current deal in today's competitive equity release market. Additionally, the results will advise how much you could save over a 20 year period. Therefore, where you have previously undertaken a release of equity, you should now consider a switch plans analysis, as it is important that you review this existing arrangement and compare it to today's more competitive and flexible lifetime mortgage schemes.

Many people fail to take advantage of this plan of action because they have the misconception that when you take equity release for the first time, then you are stuck with it for life, which is definately not the case. Similar to the way you switch bank accounts across different banks, you can also switch to newer equity releases and you have a good reason to do so as mentioned earlier. (more...)

Reaching retirement and before aiming head long into the world of retirement mortgages, give some thought to any detrimental effect your course of action could have on your children. We are not talking about any psychological issues here, but financial ones.

After throwing off the shackles of decades of employment, financial constraints with bringing up the children, struggling to eventually pay off your mortgage, retirement can bring a new lease of life and freedom. However, over exuberance can be fatal at such a time as the financial decision your make now will probably live with you for the rest of your days.

For this reason if you are looking to raise finance for your retirement, before jumping into anything like an equity release mortgage, you should consider your alternative options first. This could be emotive issues such as downsizing, taking a lodger on board, remortgaging with an interest only lifetime mortgage and asking the children for some financial assistance. The latter of which is unlikely as the children will be enduring the financials of your own past years and equity release schemes can be relative expensive, unless your opinion is the children are not to inherit? (more...)

The real value of property has risen significantly in the past and most people are keen to capitalize on that by using their homes as bait. There are various laws governing ownership of property, and most of them lean towards what the agreement may read between a home owner and a lender in the event of equity release. The same home can be used by the owner to obtain funds from a lender in what is referred as mortgage arrangement.

Mortgage arrangement involves a number of formalities which must be satisfied by all parties involved like contractor mortgage requirements , Budget limit etc. One of the most commonly used plans today is the lifetime mortgage which gives the homeowner the opportunity to cash in on his property while still living in it. It is an arrangement whereby a lender, mostly a bank gives the homeowner a large amount of money, equal to the real value of the home without the provision for repayment.

Once the homeowner has been given the money, he still remains as the owner of the home for the remaining time of his life or at least until he has moved into a permanent setting due to age or health. The lender is then at liberty to dispose the same property to another owner by selling to recover the principal amount given to the departed owner. The amount sold to recover is in most cases higher than the initial principal and that is what covers for interest. (more...)