UK financial chaos: a survival guide for your mortgage, savings and energy

theguardian.com:

The financial rollercoaster we’ve all been riding for a while took another lurching turn this week after the fallout from Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget continued to cause chaos.

Mortgage deals evaporated and were in many cases dramatically repriced upwards, throwing borrowers’ plans into disarray. Stock markets tumbled and the pound tanked, while homeowners and borrowers were warned to brace themselves for a sharp rise in interest rates, and some analysts claimed house prices could fall by as much as 20%.

Here we present our guide to surviving the latest financial crisis.

Hundreds of mortgage deals have been withdrawn from sale over the last few days, with lenders’ systems crashing as large numbers of worried borrowers and advisers logged on and tried to get through on the phone. One mortgage expert claimed that “it’s utter carnage out there right now”.

Products were pulled because banks and building societies were struggling to price their home loans amid the rapidly changing market conditions, explains Scott Taylor-Barr, a financial adviser at Carl Summers Financial Services.

“Bythe time they have set up a new deal, it’s already out of date, as the underlying cost of funds is rising sharply,” he says. “This has resulted in many lenders temporarily withdrawing from the market to allow things to settle.”

However, this is only an issue for new borrowers, he says. “If your application is already in with the lender, or you have a mortgage offer, then don’t panic, as your rate is secured.”

There are just under 9m residential mortgages outstanding in the UK, of which about 75% are on a fixed rate, according to UK Finance. About 1.3m of those deals were due to end this year, and if you haven’t sorted out a new product, you might be