Latest reductions follow a wider easing in fixed pricing among UK lenders
High street lenders HSBC and Virgin Money have announced mortgage rate cuts across parts of their residential and buy-to-let ranges, effective from tomorrow, 23 April.
HSBC will lower mortgage rates across a wide selection of products, including deals aimed at first-time buyers, home movers, remortgagers and existing customers.
The reductions cover several loan-to-value (LTV) bands and include cuts to two- and five-year fixed rate products within its fee-saver, standard, high value and premier exclusive ranges for both first-time buyers and home movers.
HSBC is also reducing rates on remortgage products, with changes spanning two- and five-year fixed deals across fee-saver, standard and premier exclusive ranges.
The lender said the repricing also applies to selected products offering cashback and to its energy-efficient mortgage options for homes with EPC ratings of ‘A’ or ‘B’. Existing borrowers will see lower pricing for borrowing more and for product switches, including reductions on 10-year fixed options.
Buy-to-let customers will also benefit from lower rates on purchase and remortgage products, including energy-efficient variants. HSBC added that international residential and international buy-to-let products are included in the changes, with reductions applied across two-, five- and 10-year fixed options depending on the product and loan-to-value tier.
In addition, HSBC has updated fixed rate end dates across its range, extending maturity dates to July for its two-, three-, five- and 10-year products.
Similarly, Virgin Money has also announced changes, cutting rates by as much as 0.45% across selected purchase and remortgage deals.
For purchases, the lender will reduce two-year fixed rates by up to 0.37%, five-year fixed rates by up to 0.45% and ten-year fixed rates by 0.40%. Shared ownership products will also see reductions of up to 0.45%.
On remortgages, Virgin Money will lower two-year fixed rates by up to 0.32% and five-year fixed rates by up to 0.35%, while its 75% loan-to-value ten-year fixed fee-saver product will fall by 0.25%.
Within its buy-to-let product transfer range, selected 60% loan-to-value five-year fixed rates will be cut by 0.10% across both £3,995 and £1,495 fee options. A 75% loan-to-value five-year fixed rate carrying a £1,495 fee will be reduced by 0.05%.
Alongside the fixed rate cuts, Virgin Money said selected remortgage two-year tracker rates will rise by up to 0.25% from 8pm today (22 April). It advised brokers to submit applications for affected products before the 8pm deadline to secure current pricing.
Most major lenders have repriced several times since early March as heightened Middle East tensions pushed up wholesale funding costs, driving higher swap rates and gilt yields and squeezing margins.
Market conditions have steadied over the past couple of weeks. Following the US–Iran ceasefire announced on 8 April, lower oil prices and a drop in the two-year gilt yield helped calm rate hike fears.
“The fixed rate mortgage price reduction announcements are still coming through which is positive news,” said Aaron Strutt (pictured right), product director at broker Trinity Financial.
“The issue is that tensions in the Middle East seem to be on the rise again and the money markets could get spooked again. We can't rule out future rate rises.
“The lowest two-year fixed rates are priced around 4.60% and there are still trackers priced below 4%.”
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