Can I get a mortgage as a professional footballer?

Your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage.

All information was accurate at the time of publication.

9th May 2024

I have been a football fan for as long as I can remember. Growing up in Chesterfield I was lucky enough to watch them reach the FA Cup Semi-Finals in 1997 where they came up against a nostalgic Middlesborough with such stars as Ravanelli, Juninho and Emerson. Chesterfield were in the third tier at the time and had a young Sean Dyche and Kevin Davies in the team.

My true love is Leeds United and I first went to Elland Road to see a 2 all draw against Everton in 1996 with Brian Deane scoring both for Leeds, and Graham Stuart and Andrei Kanchelskis scoring for Everton.

My Dad and I had season tickets during the ‘glory’ years when we got to the Champions League semi final. Supporting Leeds for the next 20 years has certainly built my resilience.

I moved down to Bristol in 2009 and have seen Chesterfield play against Bristol Rovers at the Mem, but I started supporting Bristol City properly when they won the JPT trophy and League 1 back in 2015. I had a season ticket for a number of years after this, until my Daughter was born, and have been on away days to Leeds (obviously), Cardiff, Newcastle, QPR, Milton Keynes and Yeovil to name a few.

Writing this now, the last game of football I saw live was two months ago when Bristol Manor Farm beat Cribbs 3-1 in a local derby in front of a record crowd. Non-league football is certainly a lot of fun!

So that’s my story. Life long football fan and as such, I’ve written a few blogs over the years which has brought a number of league 1 and 2 footballers to me who have found it difficult to get a mortgage when their career may be coming to an end by the time they reach their mid 30s.

As a professional footballer, the last thing you want to be spending your time on is getting a mortgage. By speaking with myself, you will quickly and easily find out what you can borrow, what it will cost and what documents you need to provide. I’m happy to speak at a time that suits you and if it’s easier for me to speak with your club directly about contracts and payslips, I’m happy to do this with your permission.

I understand how important your career is to you and your family and I’m here to help you with your mortgage so you can concentrate on football.

The main hurdle that footballers face is how long to have their mortgage for. Historically, most people would apply for a 25 year mortgage, but this isn’t written down anywhere and is just what’s affordable for some people. If you’re in your 20s and you might only have 10 years left in the game, some lenders aren’t going to be able to offer you a longer term. That being said, there are plenty of high street banks and building societies that will look into what you’re doing after you finish playing. This might be going in to coaching, or it might be getting a job outside of football. If you’ve started your coaching badges, it does make things easier, so it might be worth looking into this if it is of interest to you.

They’ll also look at what your partner does. They may have a traditional job and we can use that to help with the application.

They’ll also look at your outgoings. If you’ve got a gold membership or if you’re involved with horses, you may find these will impact what you’re able to borrow. We can run you through some affordability calculations to show you what you can borrow.

We will need to see your contracts and it might be a case of starting the conversation with your club about your next contract if there’s only a season left on it.

By having these conversations early, we can make sure we ask for the right documentation which will make your application as quick and easy as possible. We’re here to help you and to remove what can be a stressful time.

When it comes to buying a house, there will be fees that you will have to pay.

The lenders will generally have an arrangement fee of around £1,000. This can be added to the mortgage or paid upfront. If you add it to the mortgage, you will pay interest on this over the term of the mortgage. As part of my job, I’ll find you the right mortgage for your situation and will only recommend a product with an arrangement fee if that is the best option for you.

When it comes to surveys, we’d always recommend getting a detailed survey on your new home and we can put you in touch with surveyors who will be able to give you a quote. From the lenders point of view, they usually complete a free basic survey which makes sure the property is suitable, that you’re paying a fair price and how much the property needs to be insured for.

You’ll also have legal fees when buying a property and we can recommend some fantastic conveyancers (property solicitors) who can help with the legal requirements.

We charge a fee of £495 (no VAT) that is payable at application. We’ll provide you with an invoice once the application has been submitted and ask you to make a bank transfer. For this, myself and my administrator, Victoria, will manage the application from start to finish, dealing with estate agent, solicitors and anyone else involved with the purchase. Nothing is too much trouble so if there’s anything you need to deal with, just let us know.

If you’re selling your home, you’ll also have estate agents fees. We have a fantastic Bristol based agent we can recommend if you’re local, and if not, speak to 2 or 3 local agents and go with the one that you trust. Communication is one of the most important things to Adam Wells Mortgages and it should be with any firm that you are dealing with.

There are several stages to applying for a mortgage. We will be as quick as you need us to be and can usually get a mortgage recommendation back to you with a working day. If you like that recommendation, the next step is to complete the credit check and produce an agreement in principle. This is a certificate from the bank confirming that they have completed a credit check and they are happy to lend you the amount you require, subject to finding a property and completing their underwriting. This is what you give to estate agents when buying a property to show that you’re taking it seriously and that you can afford your new home.

Once your offer is accepted, we’ll firm up the numbers and if you’re happy with our final recommendation, we’ll press submit on the application. This is when our fee of £495 becomes payable. We’ll upload all of your documentation to the lender, write a suitability letter confirming why we’ve proceeded with this particular mortgage and manage the application all the way through to exchange and completion when you get the keys. Once the underwriters have reviewed the application form and your documents, they might have some questions or they may need some more documents. We’ll answer these questions and send them the documents they require. They’ll also instruct a survey which will be organised with the estate agents directly. Once the underwriters are happy with everything, they’ll produce a mortgage offer. This is confirmation that they’re happy to give you a mortgage on your specific property. The above process can be as quick as a week, typically three of four weeks and worst case, a little longer than this. We’ll be in constant communication and let you know when we expect the next update from the lender.

The mortgage offer is valid for 6 months and this means you have plenty of time for the solicitors to manage the legal side of the purchase. They will complete searches on the property and this can take a number of weeks. Once the solicitor is happy, they will speak with the estate agents and the sellers to arrange exchange, when you become the legal owner and completion, when you get the keys.

Typically, we would expect it to take around 3 months from having your offer accepted, to receiving the keys to your new home.

If you’re buying a new build property, this might be a little longer depending on when the builders complete their build.

This is a very good question and one that is asked of us all the time. I’ve been giving mortgage advice since 2009 and have helped a lot of footballers buy homes, move home, invest in property. I’ve seen everything that is to be seen in the world of mortgages. You are paying for my experience to make sure that when you apply for a mortgage, the process is quick, easy and if there are any hurdles along the way, we can jump them effortlessly. This means you can concentrate on football and your family and don’t have to worry about the stress of mortgages. We know what documents the lenders are going to ask for, we know what questions they are going to present and we can get all that information together at the beginning to remove any stress. We’re here to give you the best advice and find you the right mortgage.

You absolutely can do this yourself, but that means visiting your bank, not knowing if this is the right mortgage for you, spending time on hold to lenders, chasing estate agents, chasing solicitors. We remove one more of lifes stresses so you can concentrate on what’s important to you.

If you’re reading this blog, you’re probably already doing the right things already. What lenders are looking for is that you are on top of your finances. They don’t want to see late payments, going over credit limits on credit cards, going over overdraft limits etc. They also don’t want to see a lot of debt. If you have a car loan and a credit card, that’s absolutely fine, but they don’t want to see four or five credit cards all up to the limit. If you have some old credit cards with £0 balances, it might be worth looking to repay these. We always suggest looking at Check My File which looks at Equifax, Experian and Transunion, so you can see 3 credit reports in 1. It’s really easy to read and will show you if there are any old accounts you don’t know about and that they’re all up to date.

It might be worth registering to be on the voters roll as this can help improve your credit score.

The lenders don’t like to see pay day loans, so do avoid these.

The bigger the deposit, the more likely you are to have your mortgage approved. There are lenders that can help with just a 5% deposit, but if you can stretch to 10%, 15% or more, you’ll find the underwriting becomes more flexible.

Speak to myself as early as possible. By starting to have these conversation early, we can get you prepared for when you are ready to purchase your new home.

If you’re a professional footballer and you’re not sure where to start when it comes to buying your new home and applying for a mortgage, just complete the form below and I’ll contact you within a day to arrange a time to speak properly.