Newcastle Building Society Storm the Mortgage Best Buy Charts

Last week the Newcastle Building Society released a new range of mortgage product and they are now at either the top of the best buy charts or at number two in the following categories:

• Short Term Fixed Rate Mortgages
• Long Term Fixed Rate Mortgages
• First Time Buyer Mortgages (Moneyfacts only)
• Tracker Rate Mortgages
• Discount Variable Rate Mortgages

If the providers of these types of charts actually looked at anything other than headline rate i.e. the Loan to Value (LTV), the Newcastle Building Society’s mortgage products would be sitting at the very top of all the aforementioned best buy tables.

The only exception being, the Moneyfacts First Time Buyer Best Buy Table published in the Scotland on Sunday. Here at the www.thebestbestbuys.com we do not think that any mortgage product that does not have an LTV of 90% should be displacing products that do. If anything it shows a lack of understanding of what represents a “best buy” to the first time buyer market.

Stranger still is the fact that Moneyfacts have dropped the Furness Building Society from the First Time Buyer Best Buy table in the Scotland on Sunday for the first time in about 14 months. Having checked with Furness the product is still available at 4.94% for 3 years with a fee of £699 and an LTV of 90%. We however have put it at its rightful position of number 1 in our charts.

Moneysupermarket are even stranger as the Furness product simply does not appear in their best buy tables for first time buyers and to the best of my knowledge it never has.

Hopefully the actions of the Newcastle Building Society will force other providers to up their LTVs and we will see competition return to the UK mortgage market for the first time in over 18 months.