Loughborough Building Society has implemented positive criteria enhancements to help address ongoing affordability issues for newly qualified professionals and for those with benefits income. Following intermediary feedback, the society will now accept newly qualified professional applicants who were previously in education/vocational training, who have not completed six months in the role, or have a contract of employment that will start in the next three months. These changes apply to all product types, up to 95% LTV. The society will now also accept 50% and 100% of benefit income received, providing this income does not exceed more than half of the applicant’s total income and this can be evidenced through a confirmation letter and bank statements.

Director of mortgage sales at Paragon Bank, Moray Hulme, has today retired after more than 36 years at the company. He joined the bank in 1987 working in customer services and went on to work in the sales department in a variety of roles. This includes managing the sales support team, focusing on the buy-to-let (BTL) market from 1995, when Paragon launched its first products aimed at landlords. He was promoted to regional sales manager in 1997 where he supported the bank’s growth in the BTL sector and took up his current role in October 2019.

Foundation Home Loans has launched new special rates across both its BTL and owner-occupied ranges. For BTL, the lender has cut special rates by 0.10% on its F1 – for clients with an almost clean credit history – portfolio-only landlord five-year fixed rate products, with rates now starting at 5.59% with a 5% product fee, no application fee and a free valuation. It has also reduced rates by 0.10% on both its F1 two- and five-year fixes, with rates starting from 5.69% with a 3% product fee. For its F2 range – for clients financial a more specialist product type and/or those with blips in their credit history – and HMO two- and five-year products now start from 5.74% with a 3% fee. Within its owner-occupied product range, Foundation has reduced rates on its F1 and F2 ranges, with rates starting at 6.84% and 6.95% respectively, all coming with a £795 product fee, no application fee and a free valuation.

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