If you’ve been putting off calling a mortgage broker because you assumed home ownership was still years away, it might be time to pick up the phone. A quiet but significant shift in mortgage lending rules means many first-time buyers can now borrow considerably more against their income than they could just twelve months ago and at Resolve Financial Solutions, we’re already seeing it change what’s possible for clients across Weybridge, Reigate and beyond.
We know the headline numbers still feel daunting. The average house price in England reached £292,000 in the twelve months to May 2026, with even steeper annual growth in Wales and Scotland. Add rising day-to-day costs and mortgage rates that have crept upward, and it’s easy to see why so many would-be buyers feel the odds are stacked against them. But a change to how much lenders are permitted to offer relative to your salary means that feeling may no longer match reality.
How We Got Here
To understand why this shift matters, it helps to look back. The reckless lending that preceded the 2008 financial crisis left a lasting mark on the mortgage market and on regulation. In its aftermath, income multiples of five, six or seven times salary were seen as a red flag rather than the norm, with some voices in government at the time arguing that anything above 3.5 times income was unsustainable.
That caution was written into regulation: lenders were restricted so that only a small proportion of their new mortgages, around 15%, could exceed 4.5 times a borrower’s income. Most major lenders stayed well within that limit, which meant that as house prices climbed faster than wages, the maximum mortgage on offer often fell short of what buyers needed.
What’s Changed
Over the past year, regulators have eased that restriction. The Bank of England and the Prudential Regulation Authority have consulted on relaxing the loan-to-income flow limit, and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has separately proposed a package of reforms specifically aimed at supporting first-time buyers and other underserved borrowers. The practical effect is that many lenders, particularly some building societies and specialist providers, are now willing to lend up to six- or seven-times income, where three or four times was often the ceiling not so long ago.
That’s a meaningful change, and it genuinely opens doors. But a bigger mortgage is also a bigger commitment, and it’s exactly the kind of decision where independent, regulated advice earns its keep, helping you work out not just what you can borrow, but what you should.
What Lenders Will Still Want to See
Access to a larger loan doesn’t mean the criteria have disappeared, if anything, lenders scrutinise higher-multiple applications more closely. Before offering an enhanced mortgage, most will expect to see:
- A clean credit history, with limited existing credit card or loan debt and no missed payments in recent years.
- A stable, regular income which historically has made this route harder for self-employed applicants, though that’s an area worth a closer look (more on this below).
- Earnings that clear a specific threshold, which varies significantly between lenders and even between different mortgage products from the same lender.
- A willingness to fix your interest rate for five or ten years rather than the traditional two, since lenders use longer fixes to manage the risk of lending at a higher multiple.
- A deposit, though the range of low-deposit options has also widened, so this is worth revisiting even if you assumed you needed 10% or more.
Two Areas Worth Adding to Your Thinking
Self-employment shouldn’t rule you out. One of the biggest misconceptions we hear from clients in Surrey is that being self-employed automatically makes a mortgage harder to get. It changes the paperwork, not the possibility. Lenders typically ask sole traders and partnerships for at least two years of accounts and will usually base affordability on the lower of your most recent year’s net profit or the average of the last two years. A smaller number of specialist lenders will consider one year of trading or look at net profit before tax rather than after. Knowing which lenders take which approach is exactly the sort of detail a broker exists to navigate on your behalf.
Protecting the mortgage matters as much as securing it. Stretching to a higher income multiple means a larger monthly commitment sits at the centre of your finances for years to come. Before you exchange contracts, it’s worth reviewing whether income protection, critical illness cover or life insurance should form part of the plan, so that an illness, redundancy or worse doesn’t put your home at risk. This is also where our conversations often widen out naturally into broader financial wellbeing: pension contributions, savings buffers, and how a mortgage fits into your plans for the next five, ten or twenty years.
And if you’re not the buyer but the helper. Many of our clients aged 40 to 65 aren’t looking at their own first mortgage, they’re supporting an adult child onto the ladder, whether through a cash gift, a guarantor arrangement, or by considering equity release from their own home to help fund a deposit. Equity release is a significant, often irreversible decision that reduces the value of your estate and can affect entitlement to means-tested benefits, so it should only ever be entered into with regulated, whole-of-market advice tailored to your circumstances.
Things Worth Sitting with Before You Commit
A bigger mortgage available today doesn’t mean it’s the right mortgage for your circumstances. A few things worth weighing carefully:
- Fixing your rate for five or ten years offers stability, but it also reduces your flexibility if your circumstances or the market change.
- Your situation in five years’ time may look different from today – job changes, caring responsibilities or health issues can all affect what you can afford to repay.
- Having a savings buffer, or at least a plan for what happens if income drops, is something we’d encourage every client to think through before signing.
As with all mortgage lending, it’s important to remember that your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage. Mortgage and protection advice from Resolve Financial Solutions is based on a full assessment of your needs and circumstances, and any recommendation we make will always be regulated and suitable for you personally, not simply the largest loan available.
Let’s Talk Through What This Means for You
Whether you’re a first-time buyer wondering if these changes have brought ownership within reach, a self-employed professional who assumed the criteria worked against you, or a parent weighing up how to help your children onto the ladder, the right next step is a conversation grounded in your actual numbers rather than headlines.
Our advisers in Weybridge and Reigate would be glad to talk you through your options with no obligation. Book your free initial consultation with us today and find out exactly what’s possible for you.
*Please note: Your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage. All information is correct at the time of writing and is subject to change in the future.