Mortgage insurance protection cover could supply money that would go towards you servicing your repayments should you fall sick suffer an accident or become redundant. When taking out a policy you would have to decide the percentage of your repayment you wanted to cover and the events you want to protect against. You can take protection for redundancy alone, incapacity alone or protect both events in the same policy. Carer cover could also be included and this would allow you to take care of a close family member if they suffer incapacity. The events chosen to protect would go towards how much a policy would cost.

The sum you decide to cover is the income you get back should you have to claim and this would need to be pre-agreed at the time of applying for your protection. The income is paid each month for a set amount of months as tax free payments which is generally within the range of 12 to 24 months. You also need to have been redundant or incapacitated for a period of time before making a claim and this again depends on the provider but would fall between day 30 and the 90th day. Check the terms to be sure and also check to find out if the provider dated back the protection to the first day of suffering one of the events you had chosen to insure.

You would have to be aware that any policy you take out would cease once the policies term had been reached, that is of course should you have to claim for the full period of time. Also take into account that protection supplying an income over 24 months would cost more in premiums than cover paying out over 12 months. As you are taking out mortgage insurance protection cover to protect your mortgage repayments to help to stop you from falling behind on your repayments you should spare some thought to the fact that 90 days can be a long time to wait to claim. You could have 3 months of mortgage arrears already which would have to be caught up on. You could therefore be better off and it could cause less stress if you could claim from day 30.

If you are a first time buyer then you could look for a provider that offered mortgage insurance protection cover that was based on age. The younger generation often struggle repaying huge mortgages which leaves them with very little income left to afford expensive payment protection yet it is these individuals that need mortgage payment protection the most. Providers offering a policy that takes age into account would mean the younger generation make the most savings which makes protection affordable.

If you have a mortgage then you may already have mortgage insurance protection cover included in with the mortgage. If you have then you are probable paying more than is needed for the insurance and the chances are that you know very little about your policy. Were you aware when taking it out that cover comes with certain exclusions? Were you also aware that you could have chosen to shop around for your quote with an independent provider and compared the cost of a policy?

If you choose to compare mortgage insurance protection cover then you make savings and control the policy you take out. You would have the choice over the amount you wanted to protect. This is the sum paid back to you if you lose your own income through unemployment or incapacity. This tax free income would go a long way towards ensuring that you were able to keep up with your mortgage repayments at least for the term of the policy. You would be given your first payment somewhere between the 30th and the 90th day and payments then continue each month for either 12 months or 24 months before ceasing. You could check in the terms offered by the provider so you knew when and for how long you would be able to rely on payments. You should also check to find out if the policy is dated back to the first day of suffering from one of the events you had insured.

12 months protection can be more time than needed for you to have found another job or for you to have recovered and be fit and well enough to have returned to work so you would have to bear this in mind when comparing policies, if you have a choice of terms. However take into account that your policy would just cease once the term had been reached. Also consider the fact that a policy paying out for 24 months would come with higher premiums than one paying 12 months of cover.

Mortgage insurance protection cover can be a more viable option than turning to savings to see you through your incapacity or unemployment. They could run out well before you managed to get back to work or before you had the time to find suitable work. It could also be considered a better form of backup plan than applying for an income from the State. You would need to be eligible to claim a State income to help you pay your mortgage and even if you should be eligible the income you would get would only pay towards maintaining the interest on your mortgage. You would also have to wait for almost 3 months before getting any help and mortgage arrears would already have occurred during this time. While lenders will usually allow you some time to be able to catch up on your arrears any amount of arrears can cause a great deal of anxiety to the homeowner as they are a real threat.

Mortgage insurance protection cover helps with your repayments by providing you with a tax free cash sum if you find yourself unable to work after suffering an accident or if you fall sick. It also does the same if you were to become unemployed after being made redundant. The income supplied from the policy would then be used towards meeting your mortgage repayments each month which could keep you from falling behind into arrears with your mortgage.

Many homeowners do not know that they can choose mortgage insurance protection cover to protect their repayments by shopping around with an independent payment protection provider. Many are offered cover at the time of taking out their mortgage with the lender on the high street without any mention of shopping around and when cover is taken this way it can add hundreds of pounds more onto the cost of the cover than if a policy is taken with an independent provider. The cost of the policy with the standalone provider will be based on your age, the level of protection needed and the amount you want to cover. The amount you choose to protect, after being pre-agreed, is the amount you get back each month for the term of the policy after the deferment period. This can be between the 30th and the 90th day with some providers offering to date back the protection to the first day that you became unemployed or incapacitated. Payments then continue each month for a period of either 12 months or 24, if needed, and after this time cease.

With the standalone provider you could take out the full protection of accident sickness and unemployment together in one policy.

However your circumstances might suggest that you do not need protection for all events. For example if your employer gives you adequate sick pay you might not need incapacity benefit, if this is the case then you could just choose to take out protection against unemployment alone. However you could also just choose to protect against incapacity alone if this would suit your lifestyle better. With tailored cover you only pay for the protection you need.

While the payments would cease it can be more than enough time for you to have found work or to have made a recovery and got back to your own job. With mortgage insurance protection cover behind you there would be a substantial amount of money coming into the home each month towards your mortgage repayments. It is imperative that you are able to keep your mortgage repayments up to date as if you should fall behind by just a couple of months you would have to make an agreement to catch up or be at risk of losing your home and all the memories built up in it. However without an income coming in such an agreement might be impossible and this would lead to the lender seeking to repossess your home. With a policy to fall back onto and the income it provides you would not have to worry about mortgage arrears.

Mortgage insurance protection cover savings can be made online with a standalone payment protection specialist. By choosing to search around for your policy you could save up to as much as 40% on the premiums for the policy. The premium is decided by first deciding how much of your repayment you want to take protection for. This sum is agreed by your chosen provider and is the amount of income you get back from the policy if you suffer from one of the events you choose to protect against.

You would not be able to claim on mortgage insurance protection cover just for the odd day or two as there is a deferment period set by all providers. Some will begin paying out on your insurance once you have been unable to work due to accident or sickness or have been redundant for 30 days, with others it might be as much as 90 days. Once you have begun to receive tax free benefit you would continue to do so for a period of 12 months or 24 months which again is dependent on the provider and must be checked before taking on the policy. Some providers will also offer protection that is dated back to the first day of your being made redundant or from you becoming incapacitated.

Of course your situation might mean that you do not need to cover both possibilities of unemployment and incapacity together. If this is the case you could just consider taking out cover for the mortgage repayments for incapacity alone or for incapacity alone if this would suit your lifestyle better. The level of cover, your age and the amount you chose to protect would all go towards determining how much you would pay in premiums. Age based protection is great news for the younger home buyer as often they cannot afford the high cost cover that lenders offer. This means that protection for once is affordable as the younger you are when taking out the cover, the cheaper the premiums.

Before taking out the protection you would have to check for suitability. All providers will add in some and these would have to be checked before taking on the policy. Luckily standalone providers give you this information before you buy so that you are able to make an informed decision regarding the cover.

Mortgage insurance protection cover should be considered by all homeowners as the consequences of falling behind on mortgage repayments can be disastrous. If you miss just a single mortgage payment the lender will send a letter reminding you and of course will expect you to catch up on the missed payments. If you cannot and miss just a couple of months of payments the chance of the lender taking you to court to seek repossession is highly likely. In the worst case the judge could grant the lender repossession which of course means that you have to move out of your home and leave behind everything you have built up in it.

Mortgage insurance protection cover would provide an income that would go towards you being able to maintain your mortgage repayments if you lost your income to unemployment or incapacity. This income could make a great deal of difference to you keeping your home or losing it to repossession if you should fall behind on your repayments.

You have two options to take out mortgage insurance. One is alongside the mortgage at the time of borrowing and the other is searching around for a policy independently. If you choose to search with an independent provider you could choose how much of your mortgage payment you wanted to protect. This sum of money would have to be agreed with by your provider as they all set a limit as to how much you can insure. The amount you do protect would be paid back to you each month if you were to fall victim to one of the events you had chosen to insure against. The income would be paid monthly, tax free, for the term of the cover after the deferment period had passed. Usually this would be between the 30th and the 90th day from you being made redundant or from becoming incapacitated. Providers will usually offer a policy that continues to pay your income for either 12 or 24 months and then it ceases.

If you were to have mortgage insurance protection cover added in at the time of borrowing then you would usually pay up front for the protection. This means the lender will work out the protection over the term of the loan and add it in with the money you borrow. Interest will then be calculated on not only the money you borrow for your mortgage but also the protection for it. If you were to find that you could pay off your mortgage early then you would have paid out for insurance that you do not need and would have to look into claiming it back. Protection taken with a standalone provider is paid for monthly so while you maintain your premiums you would be eligible to make a claim at anytime. However you would also be able to cancel the protection at anytime you wanted if you paid off the mortgage.

Another benefit to taking out mortgage insurance protection cover is that you would be able to choose the level of cover needed for your mortgage. While you might want to take cover for unemployment and incapacity together you might not need to protect against both occurrences. Therefore you could tailor the cover and just take out mortgage protection for the possibility of falling victim to incapacity alone or take unemployment insurance alone. This would determine how much the protection would cost as would your age and the amount you choose to cover.

Much news was made by the government at the beginning of December 2008 about a so-called “mortgage rescue” plan it had brokered with banks and building societies in order to head off the very real fear of repossession felt by many homeowners struggling to meet their repayments. From all the fanfare that accompanied the government announcement, anyone might be forgiven for believing that mortgage insurance protection cover is no longer necessary.

Unfortunately, perhaps, nothing could be further from the truth. The barebones of the rescue package have revealed that homeowners with a mortgage less than £400,000 and savings of less than approximately £16,000 will be able to defer payment of the mortgage interest for a maximum period of two years if they incur a “significant” loss of income following redundancy, short-time working or the loss of normal overtime pay. So far so good, but it is evident that the effectiveness of such measures will rest on their detailed application – and such details remain in notably short supply, even from the mortgage lenders themselves. Furthermore, as the Labour chairman of the Treasury Select Committee, John McFall, told The Independent newspaper on the 4th of December 2008: “This is not going to be a panacea for the housing market”.

The fact remains that the rescue plan for those in difficulties with their mortgage repayments continues to hold as many questions as it offers answers – or even “false promises”, as a commentator in the same newspaper complained some three days later.

In view of the limited and uncertain degree of assistance to be offered by this latest rescue package, therefore, it seems clear that it would be dangerously premature for the vast majority of homeowners to ditch plans for arranging their own reliable and well-defined mortgage insurance protection cover.

With this type of insurance cover in place, the policy holder can be assured that the mortgage repayments will continue to be made not only in the event of the loss of income through unemployment, but also as the result of an accident or illnesses that prevents him or her from working. Most such policies will allow cover equal to a maximum of 75% of the policy holder’s normally earned income, or £3,000 a month, whichever is less. The guaranteed payments under such policies then continue for as long as the policy holder is incapacitated or unemployed, or, typically, for up to a maximum of 12 months (though polices will vary from insurer to insurer).

Simon Burgess, of mortgage insurance protection cover specialists, British Insurance, comments: “of course the government wants to be seen to be doing whatever it can to prevent repossessions on a massive scale, but the rescue scheme so far unveiled falls short of that mark. The prudent homeowner, therefore, would do well to ensure that his or her mortgage continues to be protected by adequate insurance”.

Mortgage insurance protection cover would protect your mortgage repayments against the possibility of suffering unemployment or incapacity. You could choose to cover against all three events together or you could protect against unemployment alone or incapacity alone. The provider would pre-agree with the amount you wanted to insure and this would be the income you received back if you had to make a claim. The amount would be paid back tax free after the deferment period set by the provider and for the term they specify.

If your choice of specialist was standalone provider British Insurance you could put in a claim after day 30 had passed. However you would not lose out as they would pay back on the cover to the very first day that you become unable to work from being made redundant. Once you have claimed you would have an income that would payout for up to the 12th month before it ceased. During this time you would not have the worry on your mind where to get the whole of your mortgage repayment from as the policy would provide a substantial amount towards it.

If you were to search online with other specialist providers you might find cover that could continue to provide you with an income for up to 24 months, therefore you need to read the terms. You also need to check to find out when you could claim on the mortgage insurance protection cover as with some providers it can be as long as the 90th day of unemployment or incapacity. Also compare and check the exclusions that have been included. British Insurance adds the most commonly found exclusions; however different providers could include many more. You do have to compare them against your own lifestyle before buying to ensure eligibility.

The money from your policy could mean the difference between you losing your home due to mortgage arrears or keeping the roof over your head. A single missed payment would see the mortgage lender sending out a reminder about the missed payment. If you cannot catch up on it and continue to fall behind on payments the lender would take you to court. In the worst case scenario this could mean that you would be evicted from your home.

Mortgage insurance protection cover is usually offered at the time of taking out the mortgage with the lender on the high street. Some lenders would even try and make you believe that the mortgage you are applying for is dependent on you taking the protection for it with them. High street lenders try to sell cover alongside their products as it brings them in huge profits in the excess of £4 billion each year. However you could choose mortgage cover at anytime after taking on a mortgage and shopping around does save you money.

The government has brokered a “gentleman’s agreement” between mortgage lenders and their customers that repossession proceedings will be delayed for at least six months in the event of the borrower defaulting on repayments in the hope that this will provide time for the debtor to sort out his or her financial affairs and avoid the loss of the home. Questions are already being asked, however, whether such an informal agreement can match the more certain security offered by mortgage insurance protection cover.

Many lenders have insisted that in an effort to deal “sympathetically and positively” with customers who get into difficulty with mortgage repayments they will delay repossession proceedings for as long as six months. As reported in the Telegraph newspaper on the 2nd of December 2008, however, many commentators view such reassurance as little more than a “PR stunt”. The story quotes even the Council of Mortgage Lenders as confirming that in the majority of cases, most lenders would not start such proceedings until after six months anyway.

The uncertainty of what is possibly just window-dressing will provide little comfort to mortgage borrowers, of course, many of whom are already fighting battles on at least two fronts as mortgage and other living expenses climb inexorably, while incomes remain depressed by the recession.

Worse than that, the recession is also driving up the number of redundancies as companies cut back on overhead costs or go out of business altogether. If unemployment strikes, then many homeowners will find it practically impossible to avoid mortgage arrears – unless, of course, they have taken the prior precaution of purchasing mortgage insurance protection cover.

This is a very simple, straight forward and modestly priced insurance that pays out in regular monthly instalments in the event of certain well-defined misfortunes; not only involuntary unemployment, but also an accident or illness that prevents the policy holder from attending work. With policies that allow the homeowner to purchase cover equal to up to 75% of his or her normally earned income, or £3,000 (whichever is the less amount), it is possible to protect fully the large majority of mortgages. And for the great majority of people, this will be a considerably more dependable form of mortgage protection than the “gentleman’s agreement” extended by the mortgage lender.

Simon Burgess, of one of the country’s leading providers of mortgage insurance protection cover, British Insurance, says: “many consumers will see through the vague promises currently being made by many banks and building societies. With the government breathing down their necks as they await the next handout from the long-suffering taxpayer, they would say that, wouldn’t they. But you don’t have to rely on such potentially empty promises if you’ve taken the precaution of buying your own form of security in mortgage insurance protection cover”.

Mortgage insurance protection cover could help you to remain in your home if you lost your income through unemployment or incapacity. Life can change at anytime in what comes our way and you could become redundant with very little warning. God forbid but you could also suffer from an accident at anytime or fall ill which leaves you unable to work and earn an income.

Mortgage insurance protection cover taken out with ethical payment protection insurance provider British Insurance costs up to 40% less than if you have protection added on at the time of borrowing. You would be able to insure up to a certain amount of your monthly mortgage repayment which the provider would pre-agree upon. The sum of the repayment you choose to protect would be paid back to you each month if you had to make a claim after suffering one of the events insured. This replacement income would go a long way towards you being able to service your mortgage repayments even though you have lost your own income.

There is always a deferment period before you can claim with any provider. With ethical independent specialist British Insurance this is 30 days of being continually unemployed or incapacitated. Your policy would continue to provide an income for 12 months if you should need to claim on the cover for that long. This provides you with time and peace of mind that you would not fall into arrears so you can concentrate on making a recovery or go about finding work again.

You would have to check the terms and conditions of other providers if you were shopping around for your policy. Some providers could offer you protection that would continue paying out for up to 24 months. Providers can also ask you to wait for up to 90 days before you claim on the protection. You also need to check the exclusions that would apply as some providers add in more than others with British Insurance adding in just the most common ones.

If you have not got the money to meet the demands of your mortgage and fall behind on the repayments then you are looking at the lender choosing to take you to court to seek their permission to repossess your home. If this should happen and the court takes the side of the lender then you could be given an eviction order and have to leave. Mortgage insurance protection cover could stop you from being faced with this predicament. Cover could stop you from having to make lifestyle changes which could affect the whole family.

Mortgage insurance protection cover provides invaluable financial protection in the event that you lose your job due to unemployment via involuntary redundancy or due to incapacity (ie accident or sickness. The policy will pay out a monthly cash sum that is free from tax, should you lose your income due to one of the aforementioned events.

The protection insurance cover does come with a waiting period before you can make a claim and generally this will be anything between day 30 and 90 after the event. However, look out for cover providers who will back date your claim to the first day.
Once you have made a successful claim then the mortgage insurance will continue to pay you benefits for up to 12-24 months subject to the individual provider’s terms and conditions.

How to get a good deal

If you are looking for mortgage insurance protection cover, then avoid your lender and the traditional providers and shop around among the standalone companies in order to get good value but comprehensive cover.

Also known as mortgage payment protection insurance (or MPPI), currently the cover is usually offered by the high street lender at the time of taking out a homeloan. However, taking the insurance this way if often the dearest option, with these sources raking in around £5 billion in profits every year from selling the cover alongside borrowing. This is set to change by the end of the year, with the independent body the Competition Commission proposing to ban the sale of payment protection insurance within 14 days of the distributor selling a loan or other borrowing to the customer.

This gives customers looking for mortgage insurance protection cover the opportunity to shop around and compare products and providers which is a far cheaper way to get effective cover.

To get the best quality cover for your circumstances getting quotes and buying with a specialist provider is imperative. A specialist protection insurance provider is able to back up the products they sell with knowledge about them. And as they specialise in them, the staff selling the products are well trained. This helps greatly to ensure that the individual buys a policy that is suitable for their needs.

By going with a standalone provider such as the ethical and specialist British Insurance, for your mortgage payment insurance, you can save around 40% on the cost, compared to those policies on the high street. British Insurance offer award-winning and low cost payment protection insurance cover which regularly top the ‘best buy’ tables of the finance and consumer press.
Especially in today’s uncertain economic climate, mortgage insurance protection cover can provide a financial lifeline and peace of mind that you and your family would not lose your home should disaster strike.