Hey folks,
We're about a year into our mortgage with Avant (Flex), but our rate has gone from 2.86% last year to 3.76%, so we're now looking at our options for switching.
We're a couple with young children and, like a lot of people with young kids, we're probably at one of the more expensive stages of life. Our fixed monthly costs are currently around €7k:
We're currently managing to save around €1.4k a month. Of this, €300 goes into an S&P 500 investment, and we also invest separately for the kids. We'd like to increase the amount we're saving once some of the house-related spending settles down.
Our household income is around €250K and bonuses on top but wouldn't consider them fixed. Both incomes are reasonably stable, although there is some uncertainty in our wider industry. The jobs can also involve a fair amount of work, so having a decent cash buffer and some financial flexibility is important to us.
Our current mortgage balance is approximately €840k, with an LTV of around 70%.
Overall pension balance is circa 300-350K and we have c. 70K in cash with 14K separate for the kids growing.
We're currently weighing up two options:
Avant One Mortgage – 3.4%
We'd need to reduce the term from 32 years to 30 years and make a lump-sum payment. Having only bought the house last year, this would use a significant chunk of our current cash buffer. As we're already Avant customers, we wouldn't qualify for the cashback available to new customers.
PTSB Green – 3.35% fixed for 5 years
This would allow us to keep the 32-year term initially and receive the 2% cashback. Our plan would be to put the cashback towards the mortgage and potentially use it to reduce the term. There are a few additional costs involved in switching to PTSB. We'd need a new BER, property valuation and legal work, as well as the €190 processing fee. Our current BER is C1, although we've done some work to the house since buying it and are hoping it may now qualify for B3.
So we're trying to decide how best to approach it.
Given that the rates are fairly close, we're particularly interested in how others would weigh up using cash to reduce the mortgage now versus keeping a larger cash buffer, and whether there's anything else we're missing from the comparison.
Would appreciate any thoughts or things we should be considering before making the switch.
Thanks!
We're about a year into our mortgage with Avant (Flex), but our rate has gone from 2.86% last year to 3.76%, so we're now looking at our options for switching.
We're a couple with young children and, like a lot of people with young kids, we're probably at one of the more expensive stages of life. Our fixed monthly costs are currently around €7k:
- €1,800 childcare for our two kids
- c. €3,800 mortgage (up from €3,400)
- €250 utilities, phone, internet etc.
- €280 set aside for annual expenses such as tax, insurance, car costs etc.
- €800 groceries
We're currently managing to save around €1.4k a month. Of this, €300 goes into an S&P 500 investment, and we also invest separately for the kids. We'd like to increase the amount we're saving once some of the house-related spending settles down.
Our household income is around €250K and bonuses on top but wouldn't consider them fixed. Both incomes are reasonably stable, although there is some uncertainty in our wider industry. The jobs can also involve a fair amount of work, so having a decent cash buffer and some financial flexibility is important to us.
Our current mortgage balance is approximately €840k, with an LTV of around 70%.
Overall pension balance is circa 300-350K and we have c. 70K in cash with 14K separate for the kids growing.
We're currently weighing up two options:
Avant One Mortgage – 3.4%
We'd need to reduce the term from 32 years to 30 years and make a lump-sum payment. Having only bought the house last year, this would use a significant chunk of our current cash buffer. As we're already Avant customers, we wouldn't qualify for the cashback available to new customers.
PTSB Green – 3.35% fixed for 5 years
This would allow us to keep the 32-year term initially and receive the 2% cashback. Our plan would be to put the cashback towards the mortgage and potentially use it to reduce the term. There are a few additional costs involved in switching to PTSB. We'd need a new BER, property valuation and legal work, as well as the €190 processing fee. Our current BER is C1, although we've done some work to the house since buying it and are hoping it may now qualify for B3.
So we're trying to decide how best to approach it.
- The Avant option is simpler, has fewer switching costs and gets us onto a slightly shorter term, but we'd have to use a significant amount of our cash now.
- The PTSB option gives us the cashback and allows us to retain more of our cash buffer, but comes with the additional switching costs and a 5-year fixed period.
Given that the rates are fairly close, we're particularly interested in how others would weigh up using cash to reduce the mortgage now versus keeping a larger cash buffer, and whether there's anything else we're missing from the comparison.
Would appreciate any thoughts or things we should be considering before making the switch.
Thanks!
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