Big Den

Financial Question!

Has anyone changed over to a Virgin One account for their mortgage & banking? If you did, then, did it really save you anything on monthly payments & will you actually pay off your mortgage earlier?

This has probably been asked before but, for any finance advisor types or folks that have already done it - are there benefits to be gained from cashing in your endowments & switching to a capital & interest mortgage? Given all the warnings that keep coming out from insurance companies to say that policies might not meet projections!

Main aim here is to cut monthly outlay on mortgage/insurance & release more cash for spending on Scoob - don't tell the wife tho!

Den

Note - Any references to virgins, doing it & projections (not erections) is purely coincidental!!!

fast bloke

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:<HR>Originally posted by DavidLewis:
<B>

You need discipline to run this account, since I have access to over £75,000 of instant cash at present (need to lower my ceiling again) One brief trip down the Ferrari dealer and its all gone

[/quote]

I got one of them as well. The house is worth about 80k more than the mortgage. The bank is prepared to lend me anything up to 90% of the value of the house. Gives me the option to go down to the bank and get a draft for 70k with no hassle. This is soooo tempting sometimes.

NM

I am with the Woolwich which is set up the same as Virgin but you can have up to 12 savings pots to offset against your mortgage. Only been in it for 8 months so I haven't seen a huge benefit but have saved over £100 so far on interest.

I looked at Virgin 1 but I prefer talking to people face to face when dealing with my money so phone banking is out for me.

Cheers

Neal

DavidLewis

I honestly believe I will pay my mortgage off earlier with my Virgin 1 account. I've had mine almost since the start (3 years) and had a large amount of savings earning diddlysquat in a deposit account. At one point, our mortgage payments were reduced by over £200 a month.
Phone banking is swift and efficient and very rarely have I had to wait for the phone to be answered, or get an engaged tone.

You need discipline to run this account, since I have access to over £75,000 of instant cash at present (need to lower my ceiling again) One brief trip down the Ferrari dealer and its all gone

Can you get 7% TAX FREE for your savings?
Can you borrow money for 7%
If you can answer yes to both, either you already have a Virgin One account or you have very understanding parents.

*the above comments are my own opinion and not those of Virgin One Account or the Royal Bank of Scotland. Interests rates can go up as well as down. Your home is at risk if you do not keep up your repayments on a mortgage or other loans secured on it. The value of investments and the income from them can go down as well as up and you may not get back the amount of your original investment. Please read the small print before signing financial undertakings*

blubell

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:<HR>Originally posted by fast bloke:
<B> I got one of them as well. The house is worth about 80k more than the mortgage. The bank is prepared to lend me anything up to 90% of the value of the house. Gives me the option to go down to the bank and get a draft for 70k with no hassle. This is soooo tempting sometimes. [/quote]


Yeh but so is the idea of selling up and buying a west country/welsh rally stage with a small property and no morgage


[This message has been edited by blubell (edited 21 August 2001).]

druddle

i have just gone the woolwich open-plan route and its the best for me. i am planning to get married so the savings i have and the money for the wedding will all go in the open plan acount and save me money.

at the end of the day, you MUST understand the whole package and check thats its right for you so involve an independant advisor.

dave

john banks

I previously had a Virgin One but changed to Egg - lost only a small part of the flexibility but saved over 1.2%APR in interest. There are many more competitors in the flexible mortgage market now, and unless things have changed since I moved, Virgin's rates are not exactly competitive. Put it this way, I reckon I have saved over £2000 in interest since switching *FROM* Virgin. In other words nice idea, shame about the interest rates. With Egg, I still have access to up to over 85% of the value of my property, although I currently sit with a 35% mortgage - so I can mobilise half the value of my property by tomorrow into my current account. Which can be tempting when you see yet another nice car as pointed out above

And if you want a truly independent adviser I would advise either doing the research entirely yourself (it isn't that complicated unless you make it so) or paying a fee to an adviser and have them refund any commission to you - then you know it is unbiased. I am not saying they are all bad apples, but "independent" is an ill-defined term in this industry to say the least.

Dave P

yep john with you there.

The mortgage market is so competetive at the moment you can save huge amounts of money just shopping around for the best rates.

At the end of the day you just have to build a spreadsheet and do the sums. For me Virgin 1 wouldnm't work. Just not disciplined enough. Got a nice 3.5% discount from C&G for year 1 2.5% (I think) year 2.... almost free money for 2 years at these rates.

Dave