Some of the country’s largest banks will consider mortgage applications for some flats with dangerous cladding from January, in a sigh of relief for thousands of people stuck in properties they have not been able to sell or remortgage.
Lenders withdrew mortgage provisions for unsafe flats following the Grenfell Tower disaster, when 72 people were killed in a fire at a high-rise block in West London in 2017.
Now, lenders including Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds, Nationwide Building Society, NatWest and Santander, said they would consider fresh mortgage applications from 9 January, after receiving long-awaited guidance from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) on how to value affected properties. See below.
The changes look set to benefit mortgage prisoners and prospective buyers of cladding-affected flats in buildings more than 11 metres high, though they will still need to prove that the dangerous materials will either be removed by developers, or covered by leaseholder protections or a specific government scheme.
A statement from UK Finance said that lenders have pledged to ensure “that those who want to buy or remortgage flats affected by building safety issues will be able to access mortgage finance”.
The group added that the move will “restore confidence in the market.”
