finova has launched its new retention portal, the latest addition to the company’s suite of servicing products for lenders. Powered by the firm’s SaaS banking originations platform, Apprivo, the newly improved retention portal is designed to streamline the mortgage switch journey for existing customers who are approaching the end of their fixed-term deal and are considering a product switch. The portal comes with multiple features to ensure the customer has autonomy over their mortgage switch journey, offering secure access, multiple layers of data encryption and multi-factor authentication. Customers also have the ability to self-select a convenient date to switch products and pay off any outstanding fees.

Yorkshire Building Society Commercial Mortgages has launched a new tracker product, designed for portfolio landlords. The products is available at 6.75% (bank base rate + 1.50%) for three years, and can be accessed on a capital-and-interest, or an interest-only basis. The lender will consider loans up to £20m with LTVs of up to 75% with a 2% arrangement fee. Alongside the new product, the lender has also reduced rates across its product range with discounts of 0.20% on selected products in its core buy-to-let range, as well as the specialist ranges for holiday lets and HMOs. The same reductions have been semi-commercial range, with rates starting at 4.90% on a five-year fix up to 65% LTV for BTL clients wish to borrow more than £1m, and it comes with a 3% fee.

Suffolk Building Society has made a series of rate reductions across its residential and holiday let products. The lender’s three-year fix at 90% LTV has been reduced by 40 bps, now starting at 4.99%. It has also withdrawn its 80% and 95% LTV three-year fixed options from the range, with the decision in principle for these products set at 15 April, with the application deadline set at 22 April. For Suffolk’s holiday let range, rates now start at 5.80% and 5.69% for two- and five-year fixes respectively. Two-year discount products have been reduced by 30 bps to 5.79% and its expat holiday let two-year discount rate has been reduced by 10 bps to 6.19%. For five-year expat holiday lets, rates have been cut by 20 bps to 6.09%.

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