How many lenders provide soft footprint decisions in principle for a mortgage?

Aaron Strutt Image

Trinity Financial has access to at least 25 lenders providing soft footprint decision in principle mortgage lending decisions.

Halifax for Intermediaries, Nationwide Building Society and Santander for Intermediaries are the largest lenders to offer soft footprint decisions. While Barclays and NatWest are the most prominent banks not providing soft footprint decisions.

Why are soft footprint decision in principle mortgages useful?

Soft footprints are useful for borrowers who want to know if they will qualify for a mortgage without leaving a hard footprint. It is not advisable to apply to lots of mortgage lenders to find out if you will be accepted as multiple footprints on your credit score can have an adverse effect.

Aaron Strutt, product director at Trinity Financial, says: “Our brokers regularly use the soft footprint lenders to work out if a client will qualify for a mortgage.

"Some borrowers want to know if they will qualify for a mortgage if you were to buy a property in a few months, and they do not want to reduce their credit score. Others want to know if their credit score is good enough to obtain a low deposit mortgage as these tend to be harder to access.

"A soft mortgage credit check is an initial search on your credit score where a lender can see the main bits of information about you that they need to make a decision. This is an initial lending decision, and you will need to make a full application for the mortgage to be guaranteed.”

Accord Mortgages

Aldermore

Bluestone

Buckinghamshire Building Society

Digital Mortgages by Atom Bank

Foundation Home Loans

Furness Building Society

Halifax for Intermediaries

HSBC for Intermediaries

Kensington

Kent Reliance for Intermediaries

Leeds Building Society

Mansfield Building Society

Masthaven

Metro Bank

Nationwide Building Society

Pepper Money

Precise Mortgages

Santander for Intermediaries

Scottish Widows

Skipton for Intermediaries

The Mortgage Lender

The Tipton & Coseley Building Society

Together

Vida Homeloans

Source: Knowledge Bank

Just because you fail a decision in principle it does not mean that you will not qualify for a mortgage with another lender. Thankfully there is a lot of choice at the moment.

The banks and building societies have different calculations to work out if borrowers qualify and they are based on a huge range of situations. The size of your deposit will affect the score, as well as your credit history, also if you are a first-time buyer or looking to remortgage. 

Sometimes providing more information on the mortgage application such as a landlord telephone number or another address is all it needs to gain the extra points to qualify.

If you have a missed a repayment on your mortgage, credit card, or you are in a debt management plan, it is still possible to get a mortgage if you have a track record of making repayments on time and generally have a good credit score.

Trinity Financial's brokers have access to a wide range of lenders providing soft credit footprint mortgages and they can apply to them without damaging your credit report even more. They can also talk through your application with business development managers at the lenders to find out if you are likely to qualify.

More of the lenders are providing adverse credit mortgages and the rates are not as expensive as they used to be. Pepper Money, Aldermore Bank and Kent Reliance have a wide range of credit repair mortgages. There are also some other banks offering cheaper adverse credit rates.

Some of the bigger banks provide mild adverse credit mortgages, and one building society will accept one missed mortgage payment in the last 12 months. Another bank will accept satisfied CCJ's up to £500, mortgage arrears in the last 24 months, and debt relief orders if over six years old.

Research conducted by YouGov on behalf of the lender concluded that 15% of the 4,163 respondents have experienced credit problems within the last three years. The figures also showed 16% of these people will be looking to purchase a house by this time next year.

Trinity Financial will contact a wide range of lenders with very different acceptance policies. 

Call us on 020 7016 0790 to secure a mortgage or send an online enquiry https://www.trinityfinancialgroup.co.uk/book-a-consultation/

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