The figure of the mortgage broker, also called financial intermediary, has been consolidated in Spain. More and more agencies are in charge, on behalf of their clients, of processing a mortgage application and negotiating to get the best possible conditions. Some of them also do not charge a single euro for the mortgaged future, which is a great commercial hook.
Now, is it worth entrusting the obtaining of the mortgage to a broker? According to the financial comparator HelpMyCash.com, these intermediaries usually help the client to get better conditions, although they also have their drawbacks. For this reason, it is advisable to know how these professionals work before hiring their services.
From the comparator they affirm that one of the advantages of requesting the mortgage through a broker is that the intermediary will be in charge of contacting several entities at the same time. Once the client's profile has been studied, this professional will present his request to those who usually offer the best conditions for people with the same situation. This avoids the task of having to request offers from different banks and saves time.
That time saving can also help the client to get better conditions. At this time, due to the rise in rates from the European Central Bank, entities are making all their loans more expensive, including mortgages. For this reason, speed is a determining factor in obtaining good interest, since the longer it takes to contract the mortgage loan, the more likely it will be that its price will be higher.
In fact, another advantage of hiring a mortgage broker is that, in general, you get better conditions than the ones the client can get if they ask for the mortgage on their own. In the first place, because as previously mentioned, this professional knows which entities offer lower interest rates to applicants with a certain profile. And secondly, because many intermediaries negotiate directly with the banks so that they lower their prices.
Thanks to this negotiation, brokers can get significantly lower interest rates than those offered by banks to standard customers. According to HelpMyCash, an applicant with an average profile can obtain fixed mortgages at 3% or even below (the average rate is around 3.50%), as well as variable-rate mortgage loans with interest rates below Euribor plus 0. 50% (average spread is around 0.70%).
Likewise, intermediaries can negotiate with banks so that they offer their best interests without having to hire excessive associated products that cost money, such as insurance, pension plans, cards... In the long term, this lesser link can save a good sum of money to the customer.
But this negotiation not only allows you to obtain a mortgage with a lower price. According to the comparator analysts, many brokers are also specialized in obtaining financing of more than 80% of the value of the home, which is the percentage of the operation that banks usually cover. Thus, the client can acquire the property even if they have not saved the 20% down payment that is required in most cases.
Of course, for the intermediary to obtain a mortgage that finances up to 90% or even 100% of the purchase, the applicant must be solvent. You must have saved at least 10% of the price of the house (it is what taxes and other purchase and sale expenses cost), have a stable job, receive a salary more than enough to pay the installments and have little or no current debt .
And what about the drawbacks? Beyond the best or worst service that each intermediary can offer, which will depend on the expertise of the person in charge of looking for the client's mortgage, the main disadvantage of hiring a broker is that some of them charge fees to the applicant, especially when this You need more than 80% financing. There are others that do not ask for a single euro, but their services are usually less complete.
In the first contact, the broker will inform the client if it charges fees, what its price will be and when it will have to be paid. As a general rule, its price is either a percentage of the amount of the mortgage (between 1% and 5% on average), or a fixed commission of between 3,000 and 5,000 euros on average. Most intermediaries must be paid their fees only if a mortgage obtained by them is signed.
As the conditions obtained by these professionals are usually better, paying their fees pays off in most cases. However, to make sure, from HelpMyCash they advise the client to request information from several banks to find out the conditions that he could obtain for free. Thus, you can make numbers to assess whether it is convenient for you to contract the loan with the broker.
