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 homeowners who are looking to remortgage, and the numbers will go into the millions when those on cheap two-year fixed rates come off them in the next eighteen months and desperately look around for their next deal.

Now experts have discovered that some banks want to charge four times as much as was originally agreed to redeem a mortgage loan. Which? magazine has found that some banks are telling customers to pay £295 to be able to switch to another lender. One bank’s exit fee has gone up from £50 to £225 in the last five years – that’s a 350% increase. Homeowners trying to close down an existing mortgage, and being met with surprisingly high charges are being encouraged to find their original paperwork and make sure the current charges do match those stated in the original agreement. If the charges don’t match – take issue with the provider. If anyone who has redeemed a mortgage in the past finds that their charge was more than originally stated, then they have up to six years to make a claim for the difference.

Potentially more than two million households are going to be looking for a new deal in the next year and a half as they come off fixed rate deals, and the mortgage companies want another slice off the action. Getting their money from these sneaky arrangement and exit fees enables them to keep their headline interest rates down so that they stay near the top of the mortgage league tables.