Halifax increases rates on select mortgage products – The Intermediary

Effective from Friday 1st March, Halifax has increased rates on various products, including first-time buyer, new-build and affordable housing.

The lender increased 2-year and 5-year fixed rates by up to 0.18% on first-time buyer, large loans, new-build, affordable housing – Shared Equity and Shared Ownership, and the equivalent Green Home products.

Halifax also increased selected 2-year fixed rates by up to 0.29% on remortgage products including large loans, affordable housing – Shared Equity and Shared Ownership, and the equivalent Green Home products.

Within the remortgage range, the lender also made rate reductions of 0.20% on 2-year and 5-year fixed rate products at 90% loan-to-value (LTV).

For product transfer and further advance, Halifax made rate increases on fixed rate products of up to 0.29%.

On all these products, complete dates have also been extended by one month.

The product search tool on the Halifax Intermediaries website, Halifax Intermediaries Online and sourcing systems will be updated by Friday 1st March.

To secure existing product codes, brokers must submit applications in full by 8pm on Thursday 29th February.

Newspage asked brokers for their reactions:

Robert Timm, managing director at Sunland Mortgages Limited:

“More doom and gloom as Halifax are the latest lender to increase rates.

“There’s a bit of respite for remortgaging at higher loan-to-value levels, but a quick check of these rates show they are already quite uncompetitive in this space, so is only really bringing them in line with other lenders.

“We can only hope next week’s Budget will provide some relief from the constant rate increases seen over the past few weeks.

“After a sweet start to 2024, the mortgage mood has soured.”

Ranald Mitchell, director at Charwin Private Clients:

“Halifax did seem out of step with the majority of the market last week, reducing rates when everyone else was pushing them up.

“They’ll likely have received a lot of applications as a result, meaning they’ve had to rejoin the pack to slow business volumes.

“Their rate changes will affect new and existing borrowers alike as the rate rollercoaster shows no signs of slowing.”

Gary Bush, financial adviser at MortgageShop.com:

“Lloyds Banking Group, through their Halifax brand, has sadly joined the majority pack of lenders in announcing an increase in mortgage rates from 1st March.

“Despite recently having run in the other direction, the largest mortgage lender in the UK has stopped lowering and started upping rates.

“Probably, this is due to them feeling exposed to excessive business volumes in their recent downward decisions.

“The only good news is that this lender have the decency to give a reasonable period of warning unlike some High Street lenders who announce at 4pm increases from 8pm the same day, creating overtime havoc for financial advice firms.

“This all being said we expect in the next two weeks for rates to start edging downwards again.”

Lewis Shaw, owner and mortgage expert at Shaw Financial Services:

“Here we are again. This latest increase by Halifax isn’t surprising for brokers, nor should it be for consumers.

“This is the world we now live in. A decade and a half of benign interest rates came to an end following the pandemic and it’s not going to change any time soon.

“Rather than panicking about it, we need to accept this as the new normal. It’s not what anyone wants but this is where we are.”

Darryl Dhoffer, adviser at The Mortgage Expert:

“With this move by the Halifax, all of the top 6 lenders have now increased mortgage rates in recent days, and all now are battening down the hatches for what would appear to be a bumpy ride ahead.

“As we head into the spring, it’s starting to feel like winter again from a mortgage perspective.”

Gareth Davies, director at South Coast Mortgage Services:

“The only cosistency we are getting from lenders at present is inconsistency.

“The mortgage world right now is as mad as a box of frogs.”

Ben Perks, managing director at Orchard Financial Advisers:

“These increases are not huge spikes so it looks to me like this is a tactical increase to manage case loads within the bank.

“SWAP rates appear more stable over the past two days, so I hope that there could be a few reductions on the horizon.

“The rate war feels like years ago, so a Spring bounce would be lovely.”

Elliott Culley, director at Switch Mortgage Finance:

“Halifax will be making changes to reduce business volumes.

“Swaps rates have been slowly but surely increasing and this is reflected in the current rate increases from other lenders.

“No lender wants to be the cheapest right now in a complete change around compared to last month.”

Graham Cox, founder at Self Employed Mortgage Hub:

“Further rate rises from the UK’s largest mortgage lender is depressing news after recent falls.

“Hopefully, this is short-term measure to dampen demand whilst they clear their backlog of applications.

“A Bank of England base rate cut can’t come too soon!”

Charles Breen, founder at Montgomery Financial:

“It was inevitable that Halifax would make such a move, when all their direct rivals had increased they couldn’t be the outlier.

“Just to manage business volumes and service levels alone they were forced into this move.

“Hopefully this is a temporary blip and that hostilities will resume shortly in the current rate war”