Wakefield and the villages around it, Ossett, Horbury, Normanton, Castleford, Pontefract, Featherstone, are largely made up of the sort of housing people have lived in for decades and own outright.
That is the group equity release was designed for, and it is also the group most likely to assume it is not for them.
"My house isn't worth enough"
This is the single most common assumption round here, and it is usually wrong.
Your home needs to be worth at least £70,000. That is the floor, and a great deal of Wakefield district housing clears it comfortably.
The minimum you can release is £10,000. You do not need to be releasing a fortune for this to be worth a conversation.
The other reason people rule themselves out is income. Ordinary borrowing is assessed on what you earn, and after retirement that door tends to close. A lifetime mortgage is not assessed on income at all. It is based on your age and what your home is worth. That is exactly why it reaches people conventional lending has stopped saying yes to.
What the local housing means in practice
Terraces and semis, the bulk of the housing across the district, are ordinary residential property and generally straightforward.
Former colliery and estate housing is mostly conventional too, though some of it was built to non-standard designs. Non-standard construction is not an automatic no, it simply goes to a lender for a decision rather than through a standard assessment. Worth checking rather than assuming.
Ex-local authority property is common and is not a bar in itself, though individual lenders take their own view.
If you are not sure what you have, that is a five minute question, not a barrier.
Taking less is usually the right answer
Because property values across the district are generally more modest than in, say, Harrogate, the sums involved are often smaller. That is not a disadvantage.
Interest on a lifetime mortgage compounds, so the smaller the amount and the shorter it runs, the less it costs you overall. Our advice is always to borrow only what you need.
If you need £15,000 for a new roof, take £15,000. Drawdown lets you take what you need now and leave the rest in an agreed reserve, paying interest only on what you have actually taken, which for a lot of people here is the sensible shape.
What we can look at
- Lifetime mortgages, whole of market
- Retirement interest only (RIO) and term interest only (TIO) mortgages, independent whole of market advice
- Interest only mortgages for ages 50 and over, independent whole of market advice
- Home reversion, referred to sector specialists
And if the answer is that you should not do any of it, Craig will say so. Sometimes there are benefits going unclaimed, or a grant for the repair you were going to borrow for. That conversation costs you nothing either way.
The basics
- 55 or over for a lifetime mortgage, 50 or over for a RIO
- Property worth at least £70,000, minimum release £10,000
- No upper age limit
- Joint applications assessed on the younger applicant
- Any existing mortgage repaid out of the release
Roughly up to 28% of value at 55, around 37% at 65, around 44% at 70, up to 60% from 80.
Not sure how any of this applies to your own circumstances? Craig is happy to talk it through, free and with no obligation.
Talking to us
Phone, video call or face to face. No charge for the first conversation, and our advice fee is a maximum of £1,495 payable only if your case completes.
Book a call with Craig or call 0113 403 5584.
