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Mortgage lenders jammed phone lines and wait times

Journalist: Rachel Mortimer, The Times

ended 27. September 2022

Understand mortgage lenders have huge wait times for borrowers and brokers this morning and phone lines are jammed as people rush to lock in a fixed rate - are you seeing this too? Tell me all about it!

Could missing a deal this week mean a higher rate when borrowers do mange to lock in? 

Thank you! 

7 responses from the Newspage community

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Editor
Manooch Suree
Director at Zinga Financial Services
Lenders' wait time on phones and generally in assessing applications have been long for some time now but with the recent announcements of possible rate hikes and some lenders withdrawing products, this has put even greater pressure on lenders' ability to respond in reasonable timeframes. It's important that clients seek advice from an independent mortgage adviser who can help them secure a deal quicker.
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Imran Hussain
Director at Harmony Financial Services
Phone line waiting times for some lenders were horrendous before this mad rush, and those same lenders who had 50 minute plus wait times are now likely to have over 70+ minutes. We are all going to have a mad few weeks until everything settles down.
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Mike Staton
Director at Staton Mortgages
The past two years have been a nightmare for lenders' service levels, including answering times. Lenders pulling rates yesterday have caused widespread panic and people are quite rightly worried about their financial future. My advice is simple, go and see a broker, they can lock you into a rate for 3 to 6 months right now, which could save you hundreds in the foreseeable future and avoids you sitting on the phone to your own bank not knowing if you're being told the truth.
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Graham Taylor
Managing Director at Hudson Rose
Natwest, for example, have current wait times on the broker line of 50 minutes. The concern is not only for those that are rushing to lock into a fixed rate, but also what this means for clients who have offers close to expiry. If they are unable to contact lenders in order to get the transaction completed in time, they run the risk of losing the secured product. This would have been obtained many months ago and any new rate is going to be considerably higher.
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Mark Robinson
Managing Director at Albion Forest Mortgages
We've been seeing this for a while, lenders with turnaround times of three weeks or more to assess applications. This is purely down to people trying to lock in their interest rates before further rises. The news this week that the Bank of England are considering another rate rise already will compound this, with lenders pulling rates a further complication. Even a delay of a day could mean a massive interest rate hike at the moment as lenders change rates daily.
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Stuart Powell
Managing Director at Advice Guru
My email has been pinging all morning with lenders withdrawing their entire fixed rate product range. Halifax, Virgin, Landbay, who next? This will snowball until all lenders withdraw their rates and there will be no deals available. Meanwhile, in the Equity Release world, all lenders are continuing to lend and their Lifetime fixed rates remain available to homeowners over the age of 55. Rates are increasing daily so anyone considering Equity Release should seek advice this month and reserve a rate as soon as they can. Rates can be reserved for two weeks, which will give them time to consider their options.
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Ashley Thomas
Director at Magni Finance
There is a long queue to log into HSBC to submit a new application, current wait times are over an hour. This is unusual and we have not seen this since Covid. There is a strong possibility that you will pay a higher interest rate if you delay fixing the rate this week.