Anyone heard of or used - lowratespanishmortgages

Just  wondering if anyone has used them, see below what there offering : -

I have contacted them this week and received a reply. The offer does appear to be too good to be true, so it probably is. There is a non-refundable charge for the "mortgage packagers" of €499 plus IVA, i.e. you pay this whether or not you get a mortgage offer or not - this is not a term that I've heard of before and makes me suspicious.

However I too would be interested to hear from anyone or has used them - good or bad?

There are several companies doing these foreign currency mortgages, they are generally Japanese Yen, Swiss Francs etc....

Smiley is really the man to give advice about this but in my experience they are fine,not for everyone as they are quite high maintenace and do come with fees.

Some of the lenders charge for a broker to monitor the currency markets and switch you in and out of the best currency at that moment in time.

I do not know this company in particular but i do know of others that have been offering this service for some time now.

Obviously to gain an advantage in the market there is a higher fee to pay for the service, as they say "there is no such thing as a free carrier bag!"

Make sure whoever you use is regulated and read the small print, i would imagine Smiley uses these products so i would drop him  a PM.

Hope that helps.

Thanks Georgia  

They charge 499 + IVA just to package it, if no offer, no refund... then charge 1% fee...

Cheers

Rob

I think all these companies work with pretty much the same criteria and charges.

I would be interested to know if anyone has used one recently as clients often ask me what i think of them..(the mortgages,not the clients.....)

Havent heard of low rate Spanish mortgages. There is only one lender currently offering currency mortgages for Spain that I would be inclined to trust and that is Lloyds International. They do not offer a managed service so it is very much up to the client to manage the currency risk - in fact except in extremely rare circumstances they will not lend in anything other than Euros for Spanish property unless the client is paid in the currency of choice of the loan or has some security that is based on the currency. There is MASSIVE risk unless you fit this criteria. In the late 80s in the UK Swiss Franc mortgages were being touted around the UK market - UK rates were about 7.5 to 8% and SFR mortgages were being offered at about 3% - huge number of people that got sucked in lost a massive amount of money. They are banned in the UK these days unless you meet the same criteria on earnings/security. We had a "packager" approach us to offer this service to clients - we already knew about the product on offer - the packager told us it was available to anyone with a pulse - when asked about who was managing the currency risk the reply was that the client could switch in and out of the different currency without restriction for payment of a one off fee - when I replied that was not what I meant and please answer who is managing the currency exchange risk it appeared they didnt even understand the meaning of my question. In short they are for the very well informed and experienced, the brave or the stupid. ALL THAT GLITTERS IS NOT GOLD.

Hi Smiley

Thanks for update,  i totally agree, it sounds so dodgy i did not even reply to here mail... Im keeping well away..

I spoke to Barclays about there offer of paying all fees but there LTV is only 60%....

Cheers

Rob

And tight income criteria as well.

And tight income criteria as well.

So are there any good re-mortgage deals out there ??

Remortgage is always prickly up to 65% with cashback of 3.5% post completion - however many lenders might go higher but costs at 6% ish tend to put off many people. Subject to who the mortgage is with at the moment many lenders charge a higher rate for remortgage business than for purchase so in the long run you may find you are better off maintaining the status quo.

Going back to the packaging fee issue, for the Yen mortgages, I would just be a little wary that it seems to be a third-party that is paid to do the packaging

So, if the mortgage isn't approved, for whatever reason, lowratespanishmortgages can point any blame at the 3rd party

I'm not suggesting that is necessarily the case, but I would be careful

All the lenders that I knew of, that had multi-currency mortgages, pulled them from the market some time ago

cheers

Currency Mortgages are of a high risk to reward straetegy and best used by those who have a good working knowledge of the markets and have the cash to cover any losses, even in the UK we are hesitant to provide infoirmaiton let alone recommend currency mortgages as the only time there is a real interest is when their is an interest rate feeding frenzy!

 As a summary when they work well they really work well, when they perform poorly............................

Currency Mortgages are of a high risk to reward straetegy and best used by those who have a good working knowledge of the markets and have the cash to cover any losses, even in the UK we are hesitant to provide infoirmaiton let alone recommend currency mortgages as the only time there is a real interest is when their is an interest rate feeding frenzy!

 As a summary when they work well they really work well, when they perform poorly............................

** EDITED - Spam **

** EDITED - SPAM **

There is always a risk with a multi-currency mortgage but hey, aren't we switching currencies here anyway. My Euro mortgage is costing me 30% more now than a year ago as I get paid in Pounds. I do not know of lowratespanishmortgages but my brother in law has a Yen mortgage with HSBC in England and reckons he's saved load's in the past 2 years...try Cluttons private finance

byeee

Yes, most are switching via currency exchange however if forward bought it offers a potential solution that is easier for the average person to understand, that said for those who currently have lots of equity on property in the UK it would seem sensible to remortgage that and take advantage of rates around 3% then with the proceeds "nick" hopefully something like 1.05 euro-£1 and pay off a large chunk of the spansih mortgage.

Nothing ventured nothing gained... how did George Soros make his fortune? simple currency exchange and the markets! That's what differentiates us all, some will take a mimnimal risk and others will always always play safe. As in business, the entreprenural spirit will always succeed.

The term "risk to reward" springs to mind, Soros had two major advantages over most of us;

a) massive cash reserves in pure liquid form-thus allowing him to lose and not go broke

b) due to a) above massive purchasing power meaning deals he made would not be available on the same rates to the average person

However the opprtunity as you rightly point out is there for all, we have recenlty taken up an FSA registered offer of investment into a currency fund which over the last two years has produced 4-6% per month, risk greatly offset by hedge fund taking 95% of investment and shielding.

But even hedge funds can get it wrong - I seem to recall Bankers Trust falling foul of their in house Hedge Fund taking a massive position on currencies and thought it had been hedged correctly to shield them from adverse movements and got caught with their pants down in the late 90s - ultimately caused them to be taken over by Bank of America (I think) - at the time I think BT were in the Top 25 in the world or thereabouts but certainly a massive institution

Soros also had other advantages - first he has an economics degree from the LSE - second the Quantum fund was established at a time when currency markets were very much in their infancy - he also traded a spread of currencies and didnt have all his eggs in one basket and he had a team of analysts watching market movements 24 hours a day - add to that he had enough reserves to effectively cause the Bank of England to go bust in 1992 by selling short Sterling would indicate he is not the average punter with a mortgage in Spain. Notwithstanding the fact remortgage is horrendously costly in the first instance here (typically 6 to 7% of the loan size) I would question whether it is good advice for Mr and Mrs Average who would prefer to sleep easy in their beds - if they can reconcile the remortgage cost in the first place what happens if things do go tits and they want to extricate themselves from their Yen or Swiss Franc mortgage. rates in Spain have now come to the end of their upward cycle and are starting to ease back down so annual adjustments will start to reflect new pricing. Add to that the fact that currency switch lenders have a clause (certainly those that did lend in Spain) had a clause in the mortgage deed that meant they could call on a bullet payment in the event of an adverse movement - thus the value of the property starts out at 300,000€ - mortgage taken of 250,000€ equivalent but owing to currency fluctuation value of property is is now only 270,000€ equivalent - lender has the right to immediately call in the differential to maintain the loan to value ratio. My view for what its worth and I spent 20 years trading currency markets in a former life is that they are most certainly not for the faint hearted and for the uneducated or inexperienced.

I couldnt agree more and jave poste don the risks of currency mortgages, the infgormation i mentioned was not mortgage based, I will send an eg over to you.

I know the basis of your post Shaun and that it was not mortgage related - was simply pointing out the perspective to George Soros and Mr and Mrs Average and their situation re a currency switch mortgage - if its an investment and the client/investor aware the risk reward ratio no problem

Just back into office-brass monkeys outside-the most interesting factor is that the firm of accountants have fsa approval for it-will email to you this afternoon as would appreciate your previous lifes experience on it.

dont know if you sent me anything but didnt receive it mate

Hi

I doint know if anyone can help I have had a mortgage approved by the sole bank and they have given me a rate of  Euribor + 1,75% for a amount of 119,000 Euro is this good or bad  am not too sure as the repayment seems a little high at 791.00 Euros

Thanks

Euribor + 1.75 is on the high side but many banks impose a surcharge on interest rate if you do not take some of their compulsory products. Its a long long time since we have used Solbank (I assume that is who you mean) but I seem to recall that they also imposed a surcharge for additional features such as higher loan to value or longer period interest only.

sorry cock up and posted twice

Quote p11cne:

"I doint know if anyone can help I have had a mortgage approved by the sole bank and they have given me a rate of  Euribor + 1,75% for a amount of 119,000 Euro is this good or bad  am not too sure as the repayment seems a little high at 791.00 Euros"

Crikey! That seems very high to me, especially looking at the current Euribor rate!

Smiley arranged a mortgage for us in June 2006 with GE Money and we accepted an offer of Euribor + 1.25% on a loan of 175,000€ and this month we had our review, which most banks do every six months, and our monthly repayment is only 564€.

Ask SolBank what 'Euribor monthly average rate' are they basing the loan on, as some banks use the previous months average rate, whereas some banks go back two months. Also most banks use the 12 month average rate whereas some use the 6 month average rate, again most banks review the your repayments every six months, whereas some do an annual review.

If you want to compare notes with your bank about average monthly Euribor rates, then look here:

www.euribor.org/html/download/euribor_average.pdf