Remortgage · 2026-08-06 · 1 min read
Put a reminder in for six months before your fix ends
Most lenders let you lock a new rate up to six months ahead, and reverting to a standard variable rate for even one month is the most expensive accident in a mortgage.
A fixed rate is a promise about a number of months. When it ends you do not get a letter that says “you are about to start paying an extra £390 a month”. You get a letter that mentions the standard variable rate somewhere on page two.
What actually happens
On the case we draw on the home page, a five-year fix at 5.34% reverts to 8.24%. The payment goes from £1,548 to £1,941. Nothing about the house, the borrower or the loan has changed. The lender’s variable rate is simply the price of not having decided anything.
Over the remaining twenty years, that case pays about £140,000 more in interest than the one that was re-brokered on the day the fix ended.
The six-month window
Most lenders will let you reserve a new product up to six months before your current one ends, and most will let you swap it again if rates fall in the meantime. So there is very little reason not to look early, and one very expensive reason not to look late.
Practically:
- Find the end date on your offer letter, not on your memory of it.
- Diary six months and one week before it.
- Check the early repayment charge. It usually falls away in the last month or two of the fix, and occasionally it does not.
What we do about it
We keep the end date of every fix we arrange and we come back to you six months out, whether or not you asked us to. It costs us a phone call and it is the single most useful thing a broker does after the case completes.