Smartr365 has announced that it now covers more than half of the UK mortgage market by volume, through its lender partnerships. The firm is estimating this proportion could rise to 62% in the first quarter of 2023. Smartr365 said the adoption of technology in the mortgage market has been steadily increasing over the last five years, before which appetite for lender integration was non-existent. Following the announcement of its API integration with Nationwide earlier this week, Smartr365 also announced it expects to reach over 6,000 users by the end of June 2023, with two major network integrations in the pipeline.

Castle Trust Bank has revamped its bridging range and introduced several new enhancements including the ability for fees and interest to be added to the loan above the maximum net LTVs. The specialist bank has improved the criteria on its light refurb and heavy refurb bridge products to include net LTV calculations, meaning that fees and interest can be added to the loan above the maximum LTVs. Also among the enhancements, Castle Trust Bank has relaunched its standard bridge proposition, which can be used for auction purchases, development exits, purchases and refinance.

Aspen Bridging has announced it is closing in on a record year after completing £30m of lending across 30 deals in the last two full trading months. With the largest loan size being £5.1m, lowest loan of £200,000 and an average of £1m, Aspen stated that the fastest time to funding was just eight days in this period, while more than half of the completions finalised within 20 days of initial submission. Just over 40% of completions were written on Aspen’s no valuation product, and 27% on its 75% refurbishment and light development, with the remainder on its bridge-to-let, semi-commercial and purchase offerings. Aspen confirmed that several LTVs were completed at 75%.

United Trust Bank (UTB) Mortgages for Intermediaries has followed up introducing its online decision in principle (DIP) process for buy-to-let (BTL) products by launching a new “limited edition” BTL five-year fixed rate mortgage. This product has a rate at 6.19% and comes with a 4% product fee. Switching on the online DIP process for BTL products has enabled the specialist lender to increase capacity for new BTL applications and reduce its SLA for new applications and post to 24 hours.

Landbay has announced the launch of a special edition limited range of five-year fixed rate buy-to-let (BTL) mortgages, with rates starting from 4.89% going up to 5.49%. The lender revealed that these rates are available for a limited time only on standard properties, including new-builds. There are four 75% LTV products ranging from £100,000 to £1m and four 65% LTV for landlords wanting larger loans between £1m and £1.5m, Landbay confirmed.

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