Looking to find out how much you can borrow? You might even be looking for how much your repayments will be. Mortgage calculators can help you do this quickly and easily.
Do a quick search on google and you’ll find there are various mortgage calculators, an HSBC mortgage calculator, a Barclays mortgage calculator, and there’s even a mortgage calculator google provides.
What is a mortgage calculator?
Simply put it’s a tool that gives you an estimate of how much you could borrow from a lender or what your monthly repayments and other costs might be, for a mortgage in the UK.
Mortgage calculators don’t just stop there though. There are mortgage calculators out there for stamp duty, early repayments or overpayments.
No matter where you are on the property ladder, whether you’re trying to get on it as a first-time buyer or you’re already on it and looking to move, remortgage, or buy a second home, even if you’re a buy-to-let landlord.
Different calculators can help you in different ways – each calculator does something slightly different but you’ll get an idea of what can you can borrow.
How do mortgage calculators work?
To understand how a mortgage calculator works it’s best to start with how getting a mortgage works.
There are a number of factors that a lender goes through when they’re deciding what, if and how much you could borrow:
- Your income, which lenders will cap a loan at up to 4.5 times your income.
- Your income type will be assessed. This is because not all lenders are the same and may not take a view of your entire income especially if you earn overtime or are self-employed.
- The value of the potential property
- Your credit file including any adverse credit history.
- Your deposit amount
- Your affordability
How does a mortgage calculator work then?
A quick mortgage calculator probably isn’t going to be able to calculate all this information so mortgage calculators will offer you an estimate of what you can borrow based on the main factors to be considered; income, property value and deposit amount.
So does a mortgage calculator take all these factors into account? Can a mortgage calculator accurately tell me what I can borrow?
Are mortgage calculators accurate?
There are so many mortgage calculators out there and so many mortgage calculators online. They’ll all give you a slightly different answer based on the answers you give to their questions.
So are mortgage calculators reliable?
The answer can only be that they’re only as good as the information you give them.
Providing you’re providing the right information you’ll get a good estimate, and that’s the important bit to remember, it’s an estimate, it’s a quick mortgage calculator.
It’s important to put the information you get from a mortgage calculator into perspective. Calculator tools can help you get some good preliminary information which is why we think you should use a mortgage calculator. So much so that we even have one on our website.
However, there’s a difference. With our calculator, we ask for as much detail as we can before we email or speak to you about your quote.
Which mortgage calculator should I use?
To answer that question it would depend on what you want to do.
Looking for a quick estimation then google and other high street lenders offer you quick estimates based on the mortgage amount, interest rates and term length.
You can also find them on Money Savings Expert.
However, if you’re looking for some real, detailed quotes based on your individual circumstances the Online Mortgage Guru also has a mortgage calculator.
What do you need to use the Online Mortgage Guru mortgage calculator?
- You’ll need to know what kind of mortgage you need – a new mortgage, re-mortgage or first-time buyer mortgage.
- The value of the property you’re looking at, the mortgage amount you’ll need for the property and whether you have a time frame you’ll need the mortgage by.
- How many applicants there are and your income amount.
It’s that easy. The request then comes to us so we can place it with the best advisor to give you a quote based on your individual circumstances.
Why do we do it this way?
Because we know that the unique details will matter. There are simply too many unique variables involved in each individual mortgage request to build a one-size-fits-all tool that can accurately calculate monthly mortgage payments for every user.
Get a quote today using our calculator here.
Our final thoughts.
Use a mortgage calculator, absolutely. Just use them as a guide but don’t give it too much thought until you’ve spoken to a mortgage specialist. Speaking to someone who can pick up on nuances you get the opportunity to have an actual person listen to you and provide information based on the specifics of your situation. That’s something a calculator just can’t do for you.
Speaking with an experienced broker whatever your circumstances, who has access and knowledge of the whole of market lenders and their criteria means you can get an idea of how much you can borrow before you apply. They can put you in front of the right lender based on your individual circumstances from the start.
So, once you’re ready to start looking at mortgages or even help with what you can afford contact us at Online Mortgage Guru on 0345 3669799 or email us via info@theonlinemortgageguru.co.uk and we will put you in touch with a suitable specialist to handle your enquiry.
