The really useful guide to buying your first home

We currently offer mortgages up to 85% Loan to Value (LTV) for out of area customers, meaning you will require a minimum of 15% deposit.

For customers in our operating area, we offer mortgages up to 90% LTV. Our operating area is:

• Cumbria (all CA and LA postcodes)
• South-West Scotland (all DG postcodes and TD9)
• West Northumberland (NE45-49)
• Preston area of North Lancashire (all PR, FY, LA AND BB1-3 and BB5-7)

The amount you can borrow depends on your income, outgoings and individual situation. You can get an idea of what you could borrow with our Mortgage Calculator.

For more detailed figures, call us on 012228 403141 to arrange a telephone appointment with a mortgage advisor. We will be able to show you what you can afford, and what your monthly payments would be, guiding you through the mortgage process.

The length of time it will take you to get a mortgage depends on several different factors including your circumstances, the property and legal procedures.

Once the mortgage application form has been completed, we will send a valuer to prepare a mortgage valuation report on the property to make sure we can lend you what you want. We will also check your income and financial status.

You will need to instruct a conveyancer to handle the legal details (procedures for buying a house in Scotland are different from the system in England and Wales so it is important to contact a conveyancer at an early stage for guidance).

While you're doing this, we check your application and obtain references and a valuation. Providing these are satisfactory, we will offer you the mortgage. This usually takes two to three weeks, but we can normally give you an immediate "in principle" decision.

Initial costs

In addition to the deposit you will have other expenses such as conveyancer's fees (including registration fees and possibly stamp duty land tax), valuation fees (unless the mortgage product you've chosen includes a free valuation) and insurance costs. We will go through these with you so that you can work out how much you need to borrow.

Monthly mortgage payment

The amount of the monthly mortgage payment depends on:

• how much you wish to borrow
• how many years you pay it back over
• the type of mortgage you choose
• the current interest rate, and
• whether or not you decide to pay your house and contents insurance along with your mortgage payment.

Take all these points into account and with the help of a Mortgage Illustration you should have a good idea of how much your mortgage will costs each month.

We have decades of experience in helping first time buyers, a team of experts are on hand to guide you through the process. We are currently offering £1,000 cashback for first time buyers on selected products.