The ‘good’ bank is to contain all the savings accounts and the less risky mortgage loans and investments, and will be sold off.  The ‘bad’ bank section will include all the riskier mortgages and loans.

If you are in the position of having your mortgage put into the ‘bad’ section of the bank then it is highly probable that your mortgage will be effectively locked into the bank.  This is because unless the property values increase somewhat, there is little chance that any other lender will be looking to attract these customers.  There is therefore a chance you could be left on a less competitive interest rate than others in the wider mortgage market and would struggle to move your mortgage without increasing the equity or money you put into the property.

As many in the media are currently speculating, it will be very interesting indeed to see just how many and the value of the mortgage book that is left with the Government in this ‘bad’ bank.

Firstly, are you studying using the home study method or the full time training course?  Full time training courses are naturally faster, but not everyone has the time.  Home study is of course slower but you learn at your own pace.  Each home study course has an estimated number of hours but when you can fit them in is up to you and it will also depend on how quickly you read.

How quickly do you absorb information and how do you learn?  Some people learn better from visual demonstrations such as diagrams, some like to make notes and some like to periodically go back over their study material to refresh their memory.

On the full time courses, many people are able to go straight out and take the exam after the one week but most prefer to take 7 to 10 days to digest and revise first.

On our home study courses, many people get through the material and take the exam in around 6-8 weeks, but others have been known to take 10 months.  This timing depends on home circumstances and motivation.  We offer assistance for those who need to speak to someone or perhaps have some email support, which many other courses do not offer.

Another factor we have noticed is the background people have.  Sometimes those with no background at all grasp things faster as they have no preconceptions whereas some people have experience of certain areas and this helps them.

The CeMAP and CeFA exams are not a fast and easy option that you can study for and take the exam in just one week from home, but with the right application and teaching methods, you can pass the exams quickly and more importantly, understand the material for future use.

As a result, the bank had three mortgage products in the best buy tables.

In fixed rate deals, the bank has a two year fixed rate of 3.65 per cent offered on those wanting mortgages of up to 70 per cent loan to value and a five year fixed rate at 4.99 per cent.

Northern Rock also has a two year tracker mortgage deal at 2.19 per cent over the base rate.

Plus, in addition to the interest rate reductions, the bank has brought eight new mortgages onto the market for those with a 20 per cent deposit with promises of up to £4 billion in mortgage loans in the remainder of 2009 and up to £10 billion next year.

These reductions and promises are good indications not only of further increased competition in the home market for mortgages but also good news for those borrowers currently with Northern Rock coming up to remortgage with less equity in their homes.

Other banks that reduced their interest rates in October this year include the Cheltenham & Gloucester, Nationwide, Woolwich and the Abbey.

Only today, Standard Life announced the decision to sell Standard Life Bank for a sum of £226 million to Barclays Bank.

According to Ray Boulger of John Charcol, Standard Life Bank has been a good mortgage lender for years and he believes if Barclays removes the brand and changes its ethics when the sale completes in 2010 then this is not good news.

Mr Bougler said Standard Life was one of only a few mortgage lenders still offering fixed rates for five years and more as well as buy to let loans and it has a good loan book, and he commented:

“Today’s announcement isn’t great news for consumers, as it means that one of the dwindling number of brands still active in the mortgage market may well disappear next year when the sale is concluded.

“Standard Life Bank is one of the few lenders still offering mortgages with fixed rates for longer than 5 years and is also one of a relatively small number of lenders still in the Buy-to-Let market.”

Standard Life has customer deposits worth £5.5 billion and mortgages of £8.8 billion. Subject to regulatory approval and a few other decisions, the sale is expected in January of next year. expected to complete in January 2010.

Mr Boulger added: “It is still a young bank, having been launched only 11 years ago, but has been innovative, with one of its initial products being a 25 year capped rate mortgage. However, its rates have been uncompetitive for some time, which is an indication it currently has little appetite to lend.

“With outstanding mortgage balances of £8.8bn Standard Life Bank only has about 0.7 per cent of total UK residential mortgage balances but its average indexed loan-to-value (LTV) of 48 per cent indicates a good quality book.

“Even though Standard Life Bank offered mortgages to 100 per cent LTV it only offered these to a fairly limited range of professionals and so I would expect even its high LTV book to be of good quality.”

We certainly hope this won’t be a blow to the mortgages market, but what Barclays intends to do with the Standard Life Bank brand remains to be seen.

Many training companies for CeMAP, CeFA or even CeRER training courses require you to do some pre-study before attending their training courses. Often, this means that you need to pre-register for the exams with the ifs School of Finance to receive their books – but not everyone actually wants to take the exams and some like to feel a little more prepared before making that extra financial commitment.

Other training companies send you some sort of manual before the course and ask you to read it all. One or two CeMAP providers have asked their delegates to do up to 40 hours of study before arriving on the training course itself.

What these training providers forget is the reason why people are looking for training courses. Many don’t want to, or haven’t got the self-motivation or discipline, to do this much study by themselves. Sometimes people just need to get away from the home environment to study, hence the training course.

At Beacon Financial Training, we are proud that we take students of all ages without any financial background knowledge and can take them through any of our training courses and get them qualified within a month – without any prior study.

Part of the reason for this is that all our trainers are experienced teachers who have left the teaching profession and moved into the financial sector themselves for a new career. They know how to teach people, how different people learn and how to explain the concepts of the CeFA, CeRER or CeMAP syllabus.

The new five year mortgage deal is a fixed rate at 5.09 per cent however, it is only for a 60 per cent loan to value ratio and even at that, has an arrangement fee of £599.

As we have seen, the UK mortgage market is slowly starting to recover but has yet to regain the competitive stance that mortgage lenders were taking a mere two years ago.

It is certainly pleasing to see the Post Office open new mortgage deals but also a disappointment to see the loan to value ratio restricted at 60 per cent meaning it certainly cuts out nearly all first time buyers, especially when it is this target sector that would allow others to sell and move on.

However, the new mortgage arrangements from the Post Office may indeed encourage other mortgage lenders to improve their own offerings as we expect the UK housing and mortgage market to continue to improve – 2010 will be an interesting year no doubt in the mortgage sector.

As a responsible training course company, we feel it would not be right to not include mock exams within the courses.  People are understandably asking because, having spoken to several of them, they have seen or heard of irresponsible training companies running and advertising courses and later delegates find they have to pay extra for the mock exams or question packs.

In every single one of our training courses, whether it is for the CeFA, CeRER or CeMAP exams, we include mock questions and these are from actual past exam papers from the ifs School of Finance, where the exams are set - and we include the answers too!  And we update them as the syllabuses change, which not every company does.

The only thing not included in the courses are the exam fees, and that’s because often, people have already paid for them before they take one look at the material supplied by the ifs and decide they need help from a professional training company like ours.

This would spell the end for self certification mortgages; these are mortgages that allowed people to apply for a mortgage without necessarily having the paperwork to back up their income claim.

Originally the self certification mortgage had the admirable aim of helping those whose situation made it difficult due to fluctuating income, such as contractors, self employed people or freelancers, but they were open to abuse and many borrowers took advantage of this to inflate their incomes for larger loans.  Many of these borrowers are now facing difficulties in making their mortgage payments and at worst, repossession.

The FSA may decide that this was a key factor in contributing to irresponsible lending and so self cert mortgages may form a huge part of the review and subsequent proposals regarding home loans.

What will no doubt follow will be a debate about how then to help those whose income does not conform to the usual pattern gain a mortgage.

In a future article, we’ll cover exactly what happens in the exams, but for now here are a few tips for when it comes to your big day and time to take the CeMAP / CeRER / CeFA exam that stands between you and future work in the finance or mortgage industry:

1. Arrive in plenty of time - this sounds obvious, but there are time slots pre-booked and you don’t want to miss out
2. You shouldn’t need to worry about taking paper and pen or a calculator, as all this is provided for you
3. Do take your prep notes for last minute reading and revision before you go in as most test centres have a waiting room where you can sit, take a few deep breaths and read your notes
4. Beforehand, you might want to decide on your strategy.  If you’ve taken a CeRER / CeMAP / CeFA courses with real practice questions and advice, you should already know what works for you but otherwise decide how you plan to apportion your time.  Don’t waste too long on a question you aren’t sure of, you can come back to it later
5. When you get into the exam room, try not to make noise as it will disturb other people.  Be sure to take in tissues or anything you might need during the exam
6. When starting the exam, some people find it helpful to take off their wrist watch and place it on the table so they can keep an eye on the time

Good luck!

The Tesco Personal Finance name has been binned as bosses told the media:

“We wanted a name that does what it says on the tin.”

Tesco Bank will be offering loans, credit cards and insurance as Tesco Personal Finance has done since 1997, and last year Tesco bought out its partner, the Royal Bank of Scotland.

So far this year, Tesco has made good profits and signed an additional million customers since the relaunch of its Clubcard in May.

Finance director Laurie McIlwee said Clubcard had 17 million users. He added: “Customers who were previously more promiscuous are staying loyal. They’re shopping more regularly with us and buying bigger baskets, which is what we hoped would happen.”

So we still wait to hear about mortgages from Tesco!