The Association of Residential Lettings Agents reported last week that there is a growing shortage of private rented property available vs the number of tenants looking for a place to rent.  This piece of news is supported by a number of indices reporting that rental yields have been firming up ...

I am sure that MMR is going to be a hot topic for a number of weeks and of course we should not under estimate the potential impact of the proposed changes. However, there was a fair bit of knee-jerk journalism last week, virtually minutes after the consultation paper (CP) was issued there were ...

Not a week goes by where there isn’t a press release about a broker being fined or struck off the FSA register for some kind of financial crime; this may lead you to think that fraud has suddenly spiralled out of control. However, in my experience the increase in fines and de-authorisations is ...

I did a ring around a good few brokers last week to get feedback on our new products and to gauge how busy the market was. The last few months have not been great for lending what with the general election and the lack of confidence in the markets and more recently the World Cup and Wimbledon ...

Last week I watched Channel 4’s Dispatches programme on how banks appear to have been let off lightly despite the huge injections of cash taxpayers have committed to keeping them afloat. Frankly, there wasn’t anything in the programme that hasn’t already been debated to death in the past ...

Exact are pleased to announce the appointment of Philip Horsfield as Director of Legal and Compliance. Philip will be responsible for overseeing the Legal, Compliance, Internal Audit and Operational Risk functions at Exact and Precise Mortgages. Philip is a qualified solicitor and joins the team ...

At last the World Cup has started and we can look forward to forgetting about the woes of the mortgage market for a few weeks. Anyone who knows me will tell you I don’t understand the first thing about football but I will throw myself into the numerous parties, sweepstakes and general banter ...

What will the first 45 days of the new government bring? Rumours are rife, and I emphasise the word rumours, that CGT rises will be damaging to the housing market because of its potential impact on BTL properties. As there has been little comment from the government about the detail behind the ...

Last week saw two new entrants into the mortgage market, Precise Mortgages and Aldermore. Both have a large degree of commitment to the intermediary sector and hopefully you will view the moves as very positive. New entrants to the market probably have very good reasons as to why they are ...

Recently I have been writing a lot about mortgage funding and how the lack of funding has caused material problems in the mortgage market. The forecast for this year’s gross lending numbers are broadly the same as last year at £150bn and this is despite the economy looking somewhat better ...