£11 on your mortgage

Millions of mortgage borrowers with variable rate loans face an earlier hike in their monthly payments after Mark Carney, the Bank of England Governor, said the first hike in rates "could happen sooner".

A likely 0.25 per cent rise would put at extra £11 a month on the average mortgage of £87,000.

After the Governor's speech the City of London is speculating that the increase will come before the end of the year, rather than next spring.

More than 7 million homeowners have variable rate mortgages, which track the Bank's base rate or the lender's Standard Variable Rate or SVR.

That's 65 per cent of all mortgage borrowers. The rest, on fixed rates, wouldn't be affected until their mortgage deals expire.

Some of those paying SVR might also be protected for a time, if their lenders decide not to pass on an increase.

Mortgage experts are also warning that new fixed rate deals could soon become more expensive as the financial markets begin to anticipate an earlier rise in rates.

Barclays gobbles up ING Direct

Barclays taking over ING Direct

Highlights for customers:

*Barclays promises to honour ING terms and conditions. But long term Barclays will be setting the interest rates. Savers will need to shop around.

*Mortgage customers reverting to Standard Variable Rate (SVR) would face a higher rate at Barclays: 4.99% rather than 3.99%. My understanding is that Barclays won't want them to suffer but policy to be confirmed.

*Deposit protection goes up to £85,000 from £80,000 because savers will be protected under the UK not the Dutch system

*Transfer won't happen until the 2nd quarter of next year, then there will be a 2 year transition after which the ING name is like to be dropped

*Customers should make sure ING has their correct address so they receive all the info about the transfer through the post

*1.5m customers affected, just 70,000 mortgage borrowers so virtually all savers. Average deposit is £8,300, average mortgage £80,000.

Here's more information on the ING page.

Santander mortgage rise

Santander mortgage customers on Standard Variable Rate face a hike in their payments from today.

The typical customer will have to shell out and extra £26 a month.

They're not the only ones: Co-op Bank, Halifax, Bank of Ireland and the Yorkshire and Clydesdale banks have all imposed similar increases this year.

But Santander's rate is already pretty high. Now it'll be 4.74%, compared with Halifax's 3.99%.

Here are more details from BBC Online.

And here's how the Co-op blames interest-hungry savers for the round of SVR increases.

Santander mortgage rise

Hundreds of thousands of Santander mortgage customers face an increase in their payments from October after the bank announced it was planning a rise in its Standard Variable Rate, or SVR, of half a percentage point.

The rate will move up from 4.24% to 4.74%, resulting in an average increase of £26 per month for a £100,000 mortgage

Santander said it was writing to mortgage customers to tell them about the change, which it intends to implement from 3rd October.

It explained that for the last three years the amount it costs to provide mortgages and the rates offered to savings customers have been increasing despite the Bank of England's base rate remaining static

Santander will also be writing to large numbers of borrowers who are currently on fixed rates or trackers which will revert to SVR over time. However, customers with Alliance & Leicester branded mortgages and paying SVR are not affected.

The increase follows similar moves this year from the Co-op Bank, Halifax, Bank of Ireland and the Yorkshire and Clydesdale banks.

Co-op blames canny savers for mortgage hike

Savers looking for high-paying fixed rate deals are pushing up the cost of mortgages.

That's what the Co-operative Bank says after announcing a half per cent jump in its Standard Variable Rate (SVR) for 54,000 mortgage borrowers.

The Co-op isn't the first to push up SVR. Halifax and Bank of Ireland set this ball rolling a few weeks ago.

Several have blamed the rising cost of raising money from savers and international lenders to fund their mortgages.

Now Co-op Bank says canny savers looking for high fixed rate accounts are driving the increase.

A spokesman said its mortgages are "predominantly funded through our retail savings".


And that they "are increasingly seeing a trend for savers to opt for longer term, fixed rate savings products, which typically pay higher rates of interest".

The "knock-on effect" is that mortgage interest rates have to go up.

The Co-op's variable interest rate on its Cash ISA is just 0.5%. In contrast, it offers a 2.49% fixed interest rate for one year deposits and 3.29% for 3 years.

The SVR for mortgage borrowers is being raised from 4.24% to to 4.74%.

Bank of Ireland rate hike

The Bank of Ireland is raising the Standard Variable Rate on its mortgages by 1.5%, affecting 100,000 customers across the UK.

The SVR will rise from 2.99% to 4.49% in two stages.

There will be a 1% in June this year and a further 0.5% in September.


A homeowner with a £100,000 repayment mortgage will see an £81 increase in monthly payments to £555 a month, according to the financial information firm, Moneyfacts.

The lender said the cost of funding mortgages had increased significantly. It added that its current SVR was considerably lower than the market norm and its rates would remain competitive.

The move comes after the Uk's largest mortgage lender, Halifax, said it would raise its SVR from 3.5% to 3.99% from 1st May.

Standard Variable Rate is a benchmark mortgage rate which large numbers of borrowers revert to after discount offers or fixed rates have expired.