The news that The Abbey, the Alliance & Leicester and Coventry Building Society will no longer allow people- mainly first time buyers- to borrow more than the value of their home has hardly come as a surprise in the current climate. They will soon be followed, I suspect, by Northern Rock whose reputation was largely built on their generous help to first time buyers with their 125 per cent deal and Birmingham Midshires.

Before Christmas, a third of lenders offered mortgages of 100 per cent or more. Today, just one in ten do so.

The decision to axe 100 per cent deals will make it even harder first-time buyers, to get on the property ladder. However, there is still hope.

For a similar cost to renting first time buyers can still purchase up to a 75% stake in a home of their own, via the Joint Equity scheme.

The scheme works by matching first time buyers with a private investor to help them purchase the property and on the share that the first time buyers don’t own they pay an investment return to their investor partner.

There is no landlord breathing down the necks of the first time buyers as the relationship is a true partnership-unlike that of a landlord and tenant. Plus as homeowners they can redecorate or improve the home whenever they like.

When the first time buyers choose to sell the property, they split any profit with the investor according to their ownership shares.

The required deposit from mortgage lenders offering this unique scheme is 10% of the share of the property. So if the home costs £100,000 and your share of the property is 50% you pay 50% of the deposit i.e 5% which equates in this instance to £5,000.

For more information and to obtain a free personalised illustration go to
www.joint equity.co.uk/buying.