Reductions of between 0.2 and 1.16 per cent have been made.
There is a five-year fix at 75 per cent loan to value (LTV) with a rate of 4.94 per cent, down from 5.34 per cent with a £1,495 completion fee.
Its two-year tracker mortgage has a rate of 3.29 per cent, down from 4.15 per cent. This has a £995 completion fee and is also available at 75 per cent LTV.
Ben Merritt, director of mortgages at Yorkshire Building Society, said: “We’re acutely conscious that people are feeling the squeeze from a variety of directions at the moment, with the rising cost of living and, more recently, the increasing interest rate environment prompted by the Bank of England’s decision to make successive changes to its base rate to try to control inflation.
“With market rates starting to show signs of settling a little lower than their recent peak, we decided there is a perfect opportunity for us to offer our borrowers even better value.”
He added: “As a mutual building society, we were established to help borrowers overcome challenges and we hope this extensive set of rate reductions will go some way towards easing the strain for people looking to buy or remortgage their home at the present time.”
Saffron BS cuts stress rate
Saffron Building Society has cut its mortgage stress rate from three to two per cent, following the decision to scrap the affordability measure earlier this year.
The Financial Policy Committee announced that the requirement to check a borrower’s ability to continue paying a mortgage if the rate rises by three per cent would no longer be needed from August. It was argued that this limited people’s borrowing capacity.
Many lenders are yet to publicly announce the removal of this in their own policies, however.
Saffron Building Society’s updated stress rate will apply to all residential mortgage products for new borrowers with immediate effect.
Tony Hall, head of business development at Saffron Building Society, said: “The stress rate is important to us as a lender, as it ensures that we are lending responsibly to our broker’s clients.
“However, the Bank of England’s decision to remove it has allowed us, as lenders, to look at this sensibly to see what rate would work to improve the chance for borrowers to pass affordability, whilst remaining responsible with our lending.”
Hall added: “It is all about realism. As a society, we pride ourselves on our manual underwriting and common sense approach to lending. This is just another example of that.
“By keeping the three per cent stress rate, there is a real possibility that many who would be great mortgage customers will be knocked out in the first round. The one per cent drop will make a big difference for some applicants, whilst being backed up by our expert underwriters will ensure we remain responsible in our lending, providing confidence for both brokers and their clients.”
