Furness launches large loan self-build range

Furness Building Society has launched a new range of self-build mortgages available exclusively through BuildLoan, with a selection of products offering mortgages up to £2m.

The self-build solutions include three arrears stage payment and three advance stage payment products. They are tailored for clients looking for loans from £50,000 up to £2m to build their own home.

Lasting for an initial two-year period, the discounted variable rates start from 5.64% with a maximum LTV of 80%. Furness has also increased the loan to income ratio for the new larger loan products from 5 to 5.5 times a borrower’s annual income.

All products in the range are available for purchase and remortgage in England, Scotland and Wales, and come with a £1,500 arrangement fee.

Jon Cartlidge, head of member and broker strategy at Furness Building Society, commented: “Our new self-build products, available through BuildLoan, offer our broker partners and their clients more options for building, renovating or converting their own homes - including borrowing more to make projects possible. With our flexible, human-led approach to lending, we’ve also been able to increase the loan-to-income for our larger loan products. And because every application is assessed manually by our underwriters, we can consider clients with more complex income streams.

“Brokers interested in self-build mortgages can contact our BDM team for an initial conversation, after which cases are referred directly to BuildLoan for full application support.”

Chris Martin, head of product development at BuildLoan, added: “We've designed these large loan products with Furness Building Society to provide brokers with more options for their self-build customers looking to build their extra-special home, whilst still benefitting from the package of Consumer Duty - focussed benefits only available via BuildLoan. The higher loan to income approach combined with a sensible affordability review makes greater levels of borrowing accessible to more homebuilders and renovators.

“All products provide stage releases agreed as part of the application and linked to the cost of each stage. This approach takes away the risk of down-valuation during the project and makes sure clients get the money they expect to keep their build moving.”