RiNye

Thanks for your feedback FirstWorldProblems. We will consult a specialist broker to understand if there is a UK gov or similar stipulation around homeowners living abroad, or returning expats, looking to take out equity on properties they own and rent out in order to buy a second home/property. It may be something to do with affirming residency status as someone else has commented re 'foreign buyers'. We are aware theres a storm brewing with the UK interest rates and it feels like a good time to buy - especially London - so fingers crossed we can capitalize. Cheers,

Property Equity Hi everyone, My wife and I bought and lived in our flat in London 2011-2018 before emigrating Down Under (Melbourne). Been renting it out since then. Now we’re looking at the market forces for buying in Melbourne vs London (we just rent here, haven't bought) and, amongst other UK-London pull factors, think it’s a good time to return and buy again in London. We’d like to keep our flat and to take out equity from its worth to enable us to buy a new home big enough for us + our 2 kids. Not looking to become property magnates or buy-to-letters, just a slightly bigger place and keep the old flat as an asset for our kids etc. We’ve been advised by our mortgage lender that UK property law asks that you must have lived in your property as your primary home to free up this equity and this period is for minimum ‘6months’. We have all the info on ‘things to consider’ when using property equity to buy second homes (Stamp duty etc) but I cant seem to find any info online that corroborates this stipulation, or similar information on this. I wonder if anyone else has moved back to UK/London and borrowed against their old property for this reason and if so how long did you have to live in it before getting your mortgage lender to provide the equity? Sparing the gory details, we’d like to avoid/minimise moving back to our property as we had a nightmare neighbour who really hated the fact we had two young kids running around (they adopted a campaign of intimidation for which the Council and Police did zip) ); so don’t want to put them through that again! But without using our properties equity we’re not going to be able to afford a new home. Any advice/resuorces on equity borrowing in this situation, or insights into similar experience greatly appreciated. Thanks for reading.

Property>Equity Hi everyone, posting my query on this thread as ive seen several discussions around property finance. My wife and I bought and lived in our flat in London 2011-2018 before emigrating Down Under (Melbourne). Been renting it out since then. Now we’re looking at the market forces for buying in Melbourne vs London and, amongst other UK-London pull factors, think it’s a good time to return and buy again in London. We’d like to keep our flat and to take out equity from its worth to enable us to buy a new home big enough for us + our 2 kids. Not looking to become property magnates or buy-to-letters, just a slightly bigger place and keep the old flat as an asset for our kids etc. We’ve been advised by our mortgage lender that UK property law asks that you must have lived in your property as your primary home to free up this equity and this period is for minimum ‘6months’. We have all the info on ‘things to consider’ when using property equity to buy second homes (Stamp duty etc) but I cant seem to find any info online that corroborates this stipulation, or similar information on this. I wonder if anyone else has moved back to UK/London and borrowed against their old property for this reason and if so how long did you have to live in it before getting your mortgage lender to provide the equity? Sparing the gory details, we’d like to avoid/minimise moving back to our property as we had a nightmare neighbour who really hated the fact we had two young kids running around (they adopted a campaign of intimidation for which the Council and Police did zip) ); so don’t want to put them through that again! But without using our properties equity we’re not going to be able to afford a new home. Any advice on equity borrowing in this situation, or insights into similar experience greatly appreciated. Thanks for reading.