Welcome to our unique Stage 1 interview process!
Knowing your numbers before you start looking to purchase or remortgage a property is vital because it removes all the guesswork and heartache.
“Clarity and Certainty” is the whole reason why we designed our unique Stage 1 interview process.
How to get a mortgage if you are a Self-Employed Sole Trader, Contractor or a “Limited Company Director”?
- The regulatory changes never seem to stop. Be this post the 2007 Financial credit crunch, Brexit and COVID. Simply put, it has become a lot tougher for self-employed workers, sole traders, freelancer contractors, and limited company directors to get a mortgage – but it’s not impossible!
- Yes, you will just need to jump through a few more hoops to prove your income, but it’s not as bad as it sounds if you have a great broker (like us) helping overcome all the obstacles.
- We have a proven system that reduces your stress, is painless and improves your chances of securing that new mortgage!
By the way, there’s no such thing as a ‘self-employed mortgage’. The mortgage deals are the same for employed and self-employed alike. The only difference is how you present and justify your income to a lender. We pre-check 99.9% of the lender’s criteria before you even start looking at properties.
We offer free initial conversations
How can you call yourself a self-employed mortgage specialist? Do you actually have first-hand experience and truly know about self-employed clients? A Very good question!
- Justin at JF Financial Associates is acutely aware of everything that is self-employed. Firstly, both his parents were self-employed. All four of his brothers have their own companies. One brother being a charted accountant.
- In 1998 Justin helped his father set up a new business from the ground up. So has first-hand experience of partnerships and how they work.
- In 2007 Justin set up his first business as a sole trader which was subsequently grown into a limited company that is still trading successfully.
- In 2019 Justin launched his second business.
- Justin’s spouse has her own successful self-employed business as a sole trader.
So working in the mortgage industry specialising in limited company directors and self-employed clients, with family history, own personal circumstances, and 22+ years of pure experience, yes, I truly understand every aspect of self-employment and how to help clients when it comes to mortgages for Limited Company Directors, Sole Traders, and Contractors.
Ok so what exactly is included in this Stage 1 Interview then?
We cover these vital points within our Stage 1 interview:
- Complete a full assessment of your financial situation and stability
- Review your short, medium, and long term financial and homeownership goals
- Full income and expenditure analysis
- Assess how much you can realistically afford to borrow within a comfortable budget – completing affordability checks with multiple lenders in advance of you finding a property.
- Work out the deposit required to have access to the most competitive deals
- Calculate your ideal purchase price
- Provide a full breakdown of all the costs and fees
- Comprehensive assessment of the mortgage products available
- Explain all the options, features, and risks of the products
- Pre-underwriting checks. We absolutely pride ourselves on identifying things that could be problematic at the mortgage application stage or even what could make a case fail. We then pre-check all of this directly with the lender’s underwriters before you even start looking for a property.
- Most importantly we will stress test the mortgage to make sure you can still afford it if rates moved.
When should I complete a Stage 1 interview?
Ideally, you should complete a Stage 1 interview with us long before you even start looking for a property.
This puts you in an ideal position to offer on any property you fall in love with that is within your price range, as you would have been pre-vetted before you approached the estate agent. If an offer is accepted, we can move it to Stage 2 and full submission for you.
Talk to an experienced mortgage broker who “truly understands Self-Employed clients
Do you want to know how much you can actually afford?
- At JF Financial Associates, we work out exactly what you can afford (not borrow) right from the start. We don’t care if you earn a salary, or dividends, or take a share of net profit. We assess your individual circumstances from all angles BEFORE we give you the green light to look for properties.
- Not only that but the amount you ultimately borrow will have been specifically tailored to achieve that fine balance between owning a beautiful home and having enough left over to enjoy a comfortable lifestyle. We don’t mind if the property is big or small, we just care that it is and will remain affordable for you.
- We will also happily work directly with your accountant to get the information we need. This takes the stress and burden away from you and we ultimately get the information we need to work out the correct mortgage figures for you.
- Banks will generally give you a simple calculation telling you the maximum you can borrow but their full affordability checks are typically done at the underwriting stage.
- Estate agents on the other hand just want to sell a house. If their in-house or associated mortgage advisor completes a maximum income check that passes, they are happy to sell you a house.
- The amount of time we see estate agents’ brokers and banks get the mortgage lending amounts wrong is ridiculous. Most of the time it’s down to pure inexperience or lack of knowledge of how a self-employed client’s income actually works. Regular examples of this include when they use turnover instead of net profit, use the wrong salary, dividend, or profit figures, or not accounting for directors’ loans etc.
We are very well known as a leading self-employed mortgage specialist. So much so we are regularly sought out by independent financial advisors and accountants from all over the country to help their clients. Why? Because we know our biscuits when it comes to self-employed clients!
Do you want to know the maximum amount you should spend on a property?
- At JF Financial Associates, we eliminate all the unanswered questions around a property purchase and provide you with solid guidance and numbers BEFORE you even start to look for a property, be this a house or a flat. By the end of our specially designed Stage 1 Interview process, you will be provided with a blueprint of exactly how much you can borrow, and more importantly afford.
- We reverse calculate your ideal purchase price, along with all the costs and fees associated with that purchase, like valuation fees, solicitor’s costs, legal searches, stamp duty costs and so forth.
- We also complete a comprehensive budget with you and stress test the mortgage payment to make sure that if you fall in love with a property in that price range, you can comfortably afford it!
- Don’t fall in love with a property only to be let down when you find out you can’t get a mortgage.
- Don’t try stretch yourself to the absolute limits and then find out the mortgage payments are way more than you expected or can comfortably afford.
Sole traders, Freelancer contractors or Limited company directors – We specialise in this!
Are you tied to a single lender or estate agency?
- JF Financial Associates are whole-of-market mortgage brokers and are also not geographically restricted.
- This means we are not tied to any one lender; we are not tied to any one solicitor or any one estate agent.
- This also means we don’t care who you ultimately buy your property through or where the property is in the country.
- We only ever act in your best interests, nobody else’s. We don’t care how big the mortgage is or if you take insurance or not. We just care that you are given the best advice every time!
Our value comes from offering you consistently great service and honest advice so that you come back year after year. True value to us is you being our client for the next 25 or 30 years!
Why use a Broker for your property purchase or Remortgage if you are self-employed?
Many factors apply when getting a mortgage, from sourcing deposits, and getting the correct supporting documentation, to which lender will offer you the most suitable product that won’t break the bank. You also need to give serious consideration to protecting the property and your new mortgage liability.
Justin and his team at JF Financial Associates are here to advise and support you every step of the way.
We will explain and orchestrate each phase from the initial costs involved to the ideal deposits required. How much you can lend, to getting a mortgage agreement in principle, submitting the full application, and processing it all the way through to a mortgage offer and completion.
We will even assist you with getting a basic budget planner in place, so you will be better informed on your monthly incomings and outgoings once you move into your new dream home.
We won’t stop searching their extensive list of mortgage providers until you are happy! So, what is stopping you, give us a call on 0345 508 8588 and you’ll soon be one step closer to owning your home or remortgaging it.
We will never sell you something you don’t want! We simply offer honest advice every time.
Remember that your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage, so getting the correct advice and applying for an affordable mortgage is extremely important.
Remove all the guess work and heart ache!
Also feel free to:
Send me an email on justin@jffinancial.co.uk
Call me on 07813 255 267 / 0845 50 88 588