EU Mortgage Credit Directive

The Mortgage Credit Directive (MCD) introduced an EU-wide framework of conduct rules for mortgage activities. It's created minimum regulatory requirements that all member states must comply with to provide consistency in protecting consumers taking out credit agreements for residential property.

The MCD requires lenders to provide the customer with a binding offer and a reflection period. We'll consider an offer to be binding from the date it's issued and your client's acceptance to the Mortgage Conditions which will be from when the funds are drawn down. The reflection period will last for 9 days (allowing for 2 days postage) and this will begin from the date the offer is produced. Your client can choose to waive the reflection period by contacting Nationwide or, where appropriate, by their solicitor returning the Certificate of Title.

We’ll continue to issue a Mortgage Illustrations document and include the additional MCD disclosures in the relevant sections, rather than in a separate document.

Full details of the legislation can be found on the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) website.

Foreign currency loans

EU MCD has introduced changes to the way foreign currency loans are defined, processed and managed. Our lending policy doesn't currently support foreign currency lending to new borrowers.

Withdrawing a binding offer

We can only withdraw a Binding Offer in limited circumstances, such as if:

• There's a material change to financial or personal circumstances, or a change in the property value
• There is reason to believe we've been given false information
• Investigation into the property's title raises issues making it unacceptable.

We hope we’ve covered most of the common questions. If you’re still unsure you can contact one of our experienced advisers on Broker Chat.