Key Post I switched 4 times in 6 months

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Which are banks 2 and 4? You should be able to get away with your mortgage advisor/contact person from bank 4 giving a "branch undertaking" to assign the policy in a month. This happened on my third switch.

I was moving to Ulster and their T/Cs said life policy needed to be assigned to them but BOI wouldn't release it. Chicken and egg scenario. The Ulster person said she gave an undertaking (basically a promise) to assign it after drawdown. This is common as otherwise it would be impossible to switch.

I don't recommend cancelling your existing policy. That's way too much hassle and more has complications of getting a new one.
 
Bank 2 is EBS and Bank 4 is UB
If you ask for the undertaking your fessing up that you have done multiple switches as the original bank is no longer assigned though?

I wont be changing my policy anyway as i have a very good one for a number of years
 
Inspired by the cashback thread and Sean Og, I set about switching my mortgage multiple times to a)make some money on cashback and b) end up on a lower mortgage rate with Ulster Bank at the end of the switching process.
My original mortgage was with EBS:€250K mortgage with 24 years left to pay at 3.3% rate.

I followed the advice here and applied for mortgages in all 4 banks at the same time, last March. I prepared all the documents advised in this thread and had everything ready to go. I also contacted my solicitor to discuss the plan and his fees. He agreed to charge me €1500 all in for the 1st Switch and €500 all in for each Switch he completed thereafter. I then waited for approvals to come through. This varied with the banks and some took longer than others. It took a bit of effort to keep it all moving - Ringing banks to keep it moving. Responding to them promptly when they requested anything. I organised Life Assurance with each of the banks individually and had it good to go with the in bank Mortgage insurance advisor. I wasn’t too bothered about the price knowing I mightn’t even make one Insurance payment. For the last Switch, I made sure I got the cheapest policy - in my case that was with Zurich, via bonkers.ie.

The minute I received approval from all 4, I cracked on with the 1st Switch.

Here are the dates:
BOI drawn down on 4th June. Received cash back on 21st June.
PTSB drawn down on Mon 15th July. Received cash back on 29th July.
KBC drawdown Mon 12th Aug. received cashback on Friday 30th Aug
UB drawdown on Fri 6th of September.
Received cashback: on TBC

Summary: 4 swaps in 3 months. €250K mortgage. Cashback earned: €5K BOI + 5K PTSB + 3K KBC + €1.5K UB = €14.5K in total.
Solicitor fees: €1.5K for 1st move plus €500 for each switch there after. Thus €3K in solicitor fees.
Other costs: valuations fees - circa €500 in total.
End result: Made a net gain of €11K on cashback. Upgraded my car with the fees earned. Reduced my mortgage rate from 3.3 % to 2.3% thus saving €1000s in interest. I also intend shortening my mortgage from 24 years to 18years with Ulster Bank. I will be able to do this now that the rate is much lower. I feel more comfortable with UB as they have a history of handing on interest rate cuts to customers unlike others, especially PTSB.

My Future plans: keep an eye on interest rates and see about fixing again at the end of the fixed period or even earlier if there is little or no break fee. Pay any spare cash into the UB fixed mortgage (they allow an overpayment of 10% of the entire mortgage balance annually to try to be mortgage free as soon as possible.

Sincere thanks to Sean Og and others who offered advice here along the way. Don’t mind the begrudges- go for it!
 
I would avoid going with fixed rates as you run the risk of a breakage fee if there is a change in interbank rates. PTSB were the only bank that wouldn’t offer me approval unless I went fixed. I chanced it and luckily for me there was no change of rates so I was gone to the next bank before incurring a break fee. However I do think it’s risky.
I recommend having a different block life insurance set up for each mortgage and then activating them when u need them. I think it’s simpler and quicker than trying to change a policy when moving from one bank to another.
 
Just stumbled on this thread today. all the mortgage docs looks fine.
The one things that keeps flagging to me is the life insurance. It also seems to be the least talked about item so I'm guessing most of you have had no issues in that regard.
My experience is that this drags out for people with medical conditions and the process of going through multiple checks, underwriters and GPs letters would really delay drawdowns.
Has anybody any tips for accelerating this or minimizing - maybe through one broker for different insurance companies?
Cheers and well done everyone
 
I just kept the same policy for my switches, no way was getting 3 different life policies.
See [broken link removed]
 

That's unbelievable well done! How hard was it to find a solicitor to agree to all the switches?
 
Aph2016 said:
That's unbelievable well done! How hard was it to find a solicitor to agree to all the switches?
Click to expand...
Absolutely brilliant work, i am so happy to see someone follow the instructions to the letter and not being afraid of doing somethings wrong to the Banks. I think you are the standard bearer now for all future mortgage switcher. Well done also on the solicitor deal , that was also great work. I was talking to a friend just yesterday and he has split up with his wife, but they didn't buy a house together so now he is looking for a mortgage as a first time buyer, so i am taking him under my wing and we are going to try all the banks that are offering any sort of cashback deal to see if we can get him a few €€€. I will try and break this new record of 4 switches in 6 months so i will keep everyone updated.
 
From my own personal perspective it is now Decemeber 2018 since i switched to EBS, the 3rd switch in 6 months. I am getting ready to go to BOI in December for a switch (2%) and i am also going to try PTSB although i have only been with EBS for 12 months and PTSB look for 2 years , but we have seen examples when they only look for 12 months. I will also apply to AIB and KBC and hopefully end up with Ulster Bank for the lowest rate.
 
Hi

I’ve been following this thread for a while and am ready to take the plunge but wanted to pick your collective brains about the order I was intending to switch. I’m currently with BOI and our fixed rate ends of October so it’ll default to their variable rate after that. The outstanding mortgage is €139k. We’ve used the 2% cashback from BOI so would go PTSB --> EBS --> KBC --> AIB --> UB (fixed rate).

Is there a different order people would recommend?
 
That sounds fine, there is no real difference in what order you move as long as you finish on the best rate. Remember to get variable rates when switching to avoid any penalties for moving from a fixed rate early.
 
Just started my own process currently with PTSB 2 year fixed which ends next month. Starting to pull all my documentation together and have had calls or set appointments with all banks.

My planned route is PTSB > BOI > EBS > KBC/UB > KBC/UB both KBC and UB are offering a 2.3% rate does anyone have any benefit of ending up at one over the other? I'm concerned that year end is fast approaching and that the T&Cs of everyone says drawdown must happen before 31/12/19. IF that it's not the case and time is tight I'll go with KBC as they are giving 3k as opposed to UBs 1.5k

Also I see some people are mentioning AIB I can't see any kind of offer from them for mortgages - am I missing anything?
 
AIB give €2k to switchers.
I think I would try end on UB as they allow more overpayments. Only advantage with KBC is they currently offer best current savings account.
 
Meanaspie, there is a slight difference in how the banks apply their deadline. My understanding of the deadlines for cashback are as follows:

PTSB: Receive full mortgage Letter of Approval before 31 December 2019.
EBS: Draw down before 31 of December 2019
KBC: Draw down before 31 of December 2019
AIB: Couldn't see time constraint.
UB: Application submitted by 31 December 2019
BOI: Draw down by 31 December 2019
 
Love this thread...couple of questions

What's the rush to get all done in six months? Can you not just go from one to the next and stagger applications/letters of offer? (assuming offer extended)

Can you not skip the >2 yr fixed rate at the end with UB and instead just repeat the cycle and do this indefinitely (assuming cashback offers continue)?
 
The banks have certain rules regarding mortgages, The main one is that you have to be with your current lender for 12/24 months so you can't jump from one bank to the other every 2 months and get cashback each time. Some Banks like EBS only allow you the cashback once. Not sure if anyone on here has tried to get the cash back again from PTSB , BOI etc but i will be trying both shortly to see how i get on. The mortgage approval lasts for 6 months, so when you apply to all the banks at the same time, they only see that you are looking to switch to them and not everyone else. Once you have your 3 or 4 mortgages approved you start the switching process and keep moving until they are all completed. A key thing to remember is not to wait until you have received the cash back, move within days because it is a legal requirement for the banks to pay the cash back once the mortgage has been drawn down, there is no time frame etc as it is illegal by E.U law.
 
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