At the moment I have a �15,000 additional loan on my mortgage which will be paid back in 8 years. I am struggling financially at the moment and want to decrease my mortgage payments so am looking at extending this loan to the same span as my mortgage which is just under 24 years. One of the options I am considering is to offset my mortgage with my current account and savings as well. Although I know this will bring my payments down it will mean that over the long term I will end up paying more back with interest. Would this be a really bad idea or not? I would appreciate your advice please.
It really depends on your individual circumstances! In an ideal world you would pay off your debts as soon as possible,that in turn would save you money in the long run.
But if you're struggling there may be no alternative but to increase the term and then try and overpay when you get the chance.
I don't know much about offsetting tbh,but I think they work best if you already have a reasonable amount of savings. If this is the case you could just use that money to pay back some of the loan.
How remortgaging and consolidating your present mortgage and loan in to one new loan? With interest rates dropping, now is a good time to shop around.
Weigh up the impact of any early repaying charges first. With the 15k loan, as it is regulated the redemption charges should not exceed around two months interest, including any fee's etc.