Interest rates associated with remortgages continue to be attractive and homeowners that have not yet taken advantage of them are being warned that time is drawing near for them to disappear. It was never going to last forever and at some point the historically low interest rates offered by some lenders was bound to go away. With the cost of funding for lending rising, lenders are expected to pull their cheapest rates and along with that possibility is the fact that the government rate setters, the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), could be increasing the standard base rate in the near future.

Either way, it is time say experts, for homeowners to start shopping around if they want to grasp the opportunity to secure a fixed low rate remortgage. Others are doing so as demand for remortgages recently reached a four year high. The British Bankers’ Association reported there were 24,400 remortgage approvals in July. In the same month of last year there were only 18,986 approvals. Overall, there was a 29% increase in a year on year comparison for remortgages to the month of July. New purchase mortgage approvals also were up from 41,316 to 46,033.

BBA chief economist Richard Woolhouse remarked, “This was a 29 per cent surge on 12 months before and the highest figure we’ve seen for four years. Savvy homeowners are snapping up competitive deals before an expected increase in interest rates. There were concerns that new regulations had made applying for a mortgage more onerous. But remortgaging is still a straightforward process.”