http://www.loanwize.co.uk/ Search for the best rates in personal and secured loans en Copyright 2007 Fri, 24 Aug 2007 11:03:02 +0000 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/ http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Bankruptcies are on the increase in the UK. Official figures revealed that a record number of people filed for bankruptcy in the last twelve months, and there is little doubt that the number will increase. Figures from the Ministry of Justice showed that the total number of bankruptcy petitions was up to a new twelve-monthly high of 54,536 in the year to June. In the second quarter of the year http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/bankruptcies-on-the-rise.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/bankruptcies-on-the-rise.html Loan Articles Fri, 24 Aug 2007 11:03:02 +0000 HSBC, one of the biggest highest street banks in the UK, is axing all fees on mortgages until the end of September. This late summer promotion will apply to all mortgages – for both new and existing customers. It was only last week that HSBC announced that it was removing all exit fees in response to an investigation by City watchdog, the Financial Services Authority. In spite of the announcement http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/hsbc-scrap-all-mortgage-fees-until-october.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/hsbc-scrap-all-mortgage-fees-until-october.html Loan Articles Mon, 20 Aug 2007 09:17:34 +0000 The Halifax has reported that the housing market is still slowing down, in spite of a surprising jump of £1,500 in the cost of an average home in July. Halifax’s latest House Price Index showed a 0.7% rise in the price of property in July, taking the cost of an average home up to £198,915 from £197,450 in June. The average cost of a home is fast approaching £200,000, but http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/halifax-house-index-up-by-07.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/halifax-house-index-up-by-07.html Loan Articles Mon, 13 Aug 2007 00:31:30 +0000 It sounds great, doesn’t it? Transfer your outstanding credit card balance to another card and get charged 0% interest for three, six, nine, 12 months – sometimes longer. Must be a no-brainer; who wouldn’t do it? Why wouldn’t you do it? Well, Banks love you to do it. They made £240 from credit cards offering 0% interest rates on transferred balances in Britain in the last twelve months. They made http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/balance-transfer-fees-the-latest-sting.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/balance-transfer-fees-the-latest-sting.html Loan Articles Thu, 09 Aug 2007 14:45:16 +0000 Credit card providers are always on the look-out for new ways to attract customers. Barclaycard has just launches a new card that offers a life long 0% interest deal on season tickets to watch any sports team. The idea is that the Barclaycard Football card will be used by football supporters for season tickets costing more than £250, but it can also be used by followers of other sports. The http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/barclaycard-football-card.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/barclaycard-football-card.html Loan Articles Wed, 08 Aug 2007 00:44:46 +0000 The pre-pay travel market is becoming increasingly competitive, and Barclays has just entered into the game by launching its ‘Travel Money’. The card is used by customers to put between £100 and £2,500 on it, which can be in any of Sterling, Euros or US dollars. Cards like this are growing in popularity as holiday makers are reluctant to take their regular cards abroad for reasons of security. Lose this http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/barclays-enters-prepay-card-market.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/barclays-enters-prepay-card-market.html Loan Articles Mon, 06 Aug 2007 01:39:52 +0000 Northern Rock, Britain’s fifth largest mortgage lender, has said that house prices could slow down dramatically in the next six months. The annual increase to June was just over 10%, but Northern Rock reckon that the annual rate could come down to as low as 4% by the end of the year. Problems will start to arise when the households with two and three year fixed rate deals come to http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/northern-rock-house-prices-to-slow-down.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/northern-rock-house-prices-to-slow-down.html Loan Articles Wed, 01 Aug 2007 02:11:48 +0000 The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has calculated that the UK is worth a total of £6.525 trillion. It has based its workings on the value of all the country’s assets such as buildings, roads, machinery and finances to come up with a figure for the end of 2006. That’s just over £100,000 per person (person NOT household). Do you feel worth it? Or more? The figures for the end http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/uk-is-worth-6525-trillion.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/uk-is-worth-6525-trillion.html Loan Articles Tue, 31 Jul 2007 03:23:48 +0000 If you are going on holiday abroad this year, then you a re likely to pay around £37 for using your credit and debit cards. That’s the average amount in fees that holidaymakers have to pay for using their cards overseas. Banks have been accused of profiteering from customers and campaigners have called for fees to be cut. Last year banks charged a total of £726m for card use outside http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/holidaymakers-pay-37-for-overseas-card-use.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/holidaymakers-pay-37-for-overseas-card-use.html Loan Articles Mon, 30 Jul 2007 02:15:37 +0000 If they don’t get you one way, they’ll try and get you another. Recently, mortgage arrangement fees came under scrutiny and have been shown to have rocketed in the last two years – some by an incredible 600%. In that way mortgage providers get their cut from you on your way in. They also want to sting you when you’re trying to find your way out. There are thousands of http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/exit-fees-under-fire.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/exit-fees-under-fire.html Loan Articles Fri, 27 Jul 2007 02:46:28 +0000 Finances are really beginning to bite people hard. In the past six months credit customers have had to fork out nearly £50m to card providers for fines for missing payments, and this is despite the fact that credit companies have drastically cut their penalty fees. There have been nearly 4.1 million card payments missed so far in 2007, which works out to an average of 694,506 each month. These days http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/credit-card-missed-payments-cost-50m.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/credit-card-missed-payments-cost-50m.html Loan Articles Thu, 26 Jul 2007 02:04:40 +0000 Five interest rate rises in a year have stretched borrowers to the limit and everyone is looking for a solution. What about a foreign currency mortgage? These mortgages are aimed at high earners who are happy to take a risk with exchange rate fluctuations. Investec Private Bank, for example, only lends at least £500,000, but others do start from £150,000. What overseas mortgages do is let borrowers take advantage of http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/what-about-a-foreign-currency-mortgage.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/what-about-a-foreign-currency-mortgage.html Loan Articles Wed, 25 Jul 2007 01:08:57 +0000 The last twelve months have seen buy-to-let investors make a healthy average return of 13% thanks to rising house prices that have been able to boost otherwise falling rental returns. Landlords were able to watch the value of their properties grow by an average of 7.3%, and received 5.5% in yield from rent on their properties in the year to June. However, the warning is that predicted lower house price http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/buytolet-market-still-healthy.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/buytolet-market-still-healthy.html Loan Articles Tue, 24 Jul 2007 02:23:05 +0000 According to the latest construction market survey by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) confidence in construction workloads is on the up despite a slowdown in workloads in the last quarter. The survey showed that construction workload growth slowed in second quarter 2007, but was still firm and above the long term average. In quarter one growth was 28%, but it dropped to 16% in the last three months. http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/construction-confidence-remains-high.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/construction-confidence-remains-high.html Loan Articles Mon, 23 Jul 2007 02:16:09 +0000 Some leading banks have come in for criticism after they have sharply increased their fixed rate mortgages following the recent base rate rise. Last week base rates went up by 0.25% to 5.75%, but some lenders have announced rises of up to 0.4% in their fixed rates, and more are likely to follow suit as they all try to boost their profits. From Thursday next week (19 July) Northern Rock http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/fixed-rates-are-over-priced.html http://www.loanwize.co.uk/loan-articles/fixed-rates-are-over-priced.html Loan Articles Fri, 20 Jul 2007 03:26:58 +0000