Borrowers urged to be patient with mortgage lenders

A leading price comparison site has encouraged borrowers to be patient with mortgage lenders and to not sign up to headline-grabbing deals.

Following last week's decision by the Bank of England to cut interest rates, Louise Cuming, head of mortgages at Moneysupermarket.com, said that standard variable rate (SVR) mortgages are "back in vogue".

"For many customers simply reverting to the default SVR rate their lender subscribes them to at the end of their current deal may save money on their mortgage bills; as doing so incurs no fee," she said.

Ms Cuming added that if mortgage customers chose to change on to a fixed rate deal, they could be subjected to a percentage fee charge — which is why borrowers should be vigilant and avoid the publicised fixed rate deals.

The mortgage expert said that customers were better off playing the waiting game on their SVR.

According to recent research by Moneyfacts.co.uk, customers with fixed rate mortgages are paying nearly twice the cost to lenders of funding on the money markets.

Mortgages News posted on 14/11/2008 15:31:23