Thousands of people still have mortgages based upon interest only payments, meaning no capital repayment is made. Herein lies the problem. Perhaps you thought paying interest-only wasn’t an issue and you would have sold the property and moved on way before the end of the mortgage term. In UK Lending's experience, this is not always the case.

Many of these loans are pre 2008, before the financial crisis, when a huge number of mortgages were agreed on a self-certification of income basis.  Meaning that homeowners were able to borrow more money based on their income along with cheaper payments of interest-only.

The challenge is deciding if any loan repayment vehicle you have in place, such as an endowment policy, stocks and shares ISA, investment bond or pension is on track to repay the debt at the end of the mortgage term. If you are in the enviable position to have reviewed and kept up a repayment investment vehicle to ensure you are on track, there shouldn’t be many surprises. Typically not everyone is in this fortunate position potentially leading to a few difficult decisions down the road.

Many banks and lenders have created a number of products to potentially offer you a helping hand as you approach that cliff edge, called “lending into retirement”.

The potential of capital raising against what could be a large amount of equity is possible, although each applicant must be viewed on a case by case basis.

Yes, there are many options.  So do get in touch and arrange a time to get together to find the best solution for you going forward.