Porting your Mortgage

What is it?

If you are currently in a fixed rate mortgage and want to move home, you might be able to take your mortgage balance (and rate) over to a new property when you sell your home. It’s where your rate may be ‘portable’ and we call it ‘porting’.

Is your rate Portable?

You can check if your mortgage rate is portable, by looking at your mortgage offer in the section that talks about its ‘Flexible features’ which is usually section 9.

Are there conditions

Although your mortgage offer may state your rate is portable if you move home, you don't get the automatic right to do this.

The lender will still need to carry out all their usual checks and assessment when you apply for the new mortgage, including a credit check, affordability assessment and ensuring you fit their criteria. So you’ll still need to make a full application and supply all the required documentation to them.

Benefits of Porting

In the current climate, where interest may be higher than you have previously fixed your mortgage rate at, it can be beneficial to keep that nice low rate and move it on to your next property. You will also usually avoid those early repayment charges (ERCs) if you port your mortgage over if you do a simultaneous sale and purchase.

What if you want to borrow more?

If you are looking to increase your mortgage, the lender will usually only allow you to port over the remaining blance on that rate. If you want to borrow extra, then you will normally need to do this on one of their rates available at the time of putting in your mortgage application.

This will mean your new mortgage will be split in two (or more) rates that may have different ends dates for the fixed rate period.

What if you want to borrow less?

If you want to move home and borrow less than you currently owe on your fixed rate (for example if you are down sizing) then you may have to pay the early repayment charge on the amount you are reducing by. Some lenders may offer the facility where they allow ‘over payments’ that don’t incur an early repayment charge. This can typically be up to 10%

Can one person ‘port’ the mortgage?

There can be situations where joint applicants on a mortgage decide to go their separate ways when they sell a property. In these circumstances, rather than have to pay the early repayment charges to get out of the mortgage, the lender may allow just one person to ‘port’ the mortgage over to the new property, subject to meeting all the conditions described above.

You may also be able to add a completely new person to the mortgage being ported, if for example you have a new partner that wants to join you on the new mortgage.

Need to know more?

If you have any further questions about porting a mortgage rate you can contact your lender who will explain your options or contact a good mortgage advisor who should be able to guide you further. If you’d like our help please call us on 01580 447 447 or contact us here

Your home may be at risk if you do not keep up repayments on a mortgage