How long should you lock in your mortgage – and what after that for rates? This is the Money podcast
As if buying a house wasn’t enough of a lottery, borrowers now face a big gamble on their mortgage.
Whether buying or re-mortgaging, they need to figure out how long to fix and try to assess what can happen next to interest rates.
Given the fact that even the world’s best economists and investors have failed to notice the sudden rise in interest rates over the past year and cannot agree on what central banks will do next, that is a tough task.
A five-year fixed rate is cheaper than a two-year fixed rate, but borrowers worry that they risk being locked into higher rates for longer.
Meanwhile, trackers are more expensive but could fall if base rates fall, although there’s not much agreement on when the Bank of England will stop hiking, or how quickly it will cut rates when it eventually does.
In this podcast, Georgie Frost, Helen Crane and Simon Lambert discuss the big mortgage gamble and what people can do.
Also on the show, the home price hotspots of the past decade – and why living in a place where home values have doubled may not be a good thing.
Simon takes a look at UK stocks, why they’re considered cheap and whether they’re a good investment or not.
Helen talks through her latest Crane on the Case and how it went for a loyal BA customer who couldn’t access a staggering number of Avios points and was given a rough deal by the airline to sort it out.
And finally, here’s a test of your age: how well do you remember the Ford Orion, Austin Maestro and Vauxhall Nova… and did you ever imagine that one day they would become classic cars?