Vida has improved its buy-to-let range to give advisers greater flexibility in an increasingly challenging market.
The specialist lender has removed all constraints on debt consolidation to allow capital raising remortgages for any purpose and eliminated the need for a floating charge on special purpose vehicles (SPVs), which are set up for property investment.
It has also increased the maximum loan-to-value on entire portfolios from 75 per cent to 80 per cent and reduced the minimum property valuation to £50,000.
In addition, Vida has improved its criteria for multi-unit blocks (MUBs), bringing in a minimum valuation per block (rather than per unit) and allowing up to five units.
The minimum amount of experience of owning a buy-to-let property for both MUBs and houses of multiple occupation (HMOs) required has also been cut.
Louisa Sedgwick, director of sales for mortgages at Vida Homeloans, said: “Following some enthusiastic feedback from our partners, this latest refresh of our buy-to-let lending criteria is part of Vida Homeloans’ commitment to offer intermediaries innovation and flexibility in securing the best mortgage deal for their client’s needs.
“We have made a number of rate cuts recently and we’re confident that this combination of criteria and pricing will prove attractive to our brokers, networks and packager partners.”
Bradley Moore, managing director at Billericay-based Brightstar, said: "The improvements to the product range offered by Vida will certainly make placing those difficult buy-to-let enquiries a lot easier.
"Vida have become extremely competitive when it comes to rate and continue to tweak their criteria. The changes will help them write business that could perhaps not previously have been placed or that may have attracted higher rates of interest from alternative lenders."
simon.allin@ft.com
