In this day and age, with prices for everything being forced up because of the rapidly rising price of gas, more people are finding themselves getting deeper into debt and being caught in a vicious cycle. They live on their credit cards but only pay minimum payments every month so the amount owed on the cards rises while the balance does not get paid off.

When one card gets full then they move on to getting another card. It doesn’t take long to get so deep into debt that you cannot see the light of day anymore. The idea of getting out of debt is difficult for many people because it can create a feeling of failure. It is like you have failed at maintaining your lifestyle. I am here to tell you that having the need for getting out of debt is normal and far from being a failure on your part.

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Self-certification mortgages have not enjoyed a good reputation in the property market in recent years. Several years ago evidence emerged that some applicants were exaggerating their incomes in order to achieve bigger loans. It was alleged that a minority of applicants may have also been lying about their incomes altogether and may have actually been unemployed.

Since then the Financial Services Authority, and several media companies, have conducted research into the self-cert market. While the FSA has given the market the green light on several occasions others have not. Self-certification mortgages have been labeled “liar loans” in the United States and while they haven’t adopted the same nickname in the UK their reputation is similar.

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Equity has long been the golden egg of the property investing world. Build up enough equity in your property portfolio and you will never need to work again. Countless celebrity investors and seminar givers have championed the call for us all to buy property and build up equity so we can live the dream of telling our boss where to go and quitting our jobs once and for all.

So how does it work? How does equity help us to achieve our dreams and regain our freedom? After all, equity is not cash and we pay for things with cash. Equity is a paper profit or wealth that exists only on paper. In order to cash in our paper wealth do we not need to sell our buy-to-let properties? This is the question amateur investors and complete novices are most likely to ask.

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Recent news has emerged regarding the staff of a well known lender finding themselves in a position in which they cannot refinance their own homes. Such a circumstance is quite ironic in addition to being ridiculous and shameful. The staff may not be the only home owners finding it difficult to locate appropriate remortgages in the current financial climate but their situation is certainly the most bizarre.

The lender is question is Northern Rock. This lender had previously grown to be one of the country’s largest and most successful mortgage lenders before the quality of its loan book was uncovered after the sub-prime mortgage debacle made its way across the pond. Thousands of bad credit mortgages were found to be at risk or in default and the inappropriately named Rock was thrown into turmoil.

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