Hanley Economic Building Society Adds Holiday Let Mortgages

Hanley Economic Building Society has started offering mortgages for holiday let properties, adding a specialist product line at a mutual better known for standard residential and buy-to-let lending. The society, based in Stoke-on-Trent, joins a short list of building societies and niche lenders willing to underwrite holiday let purchases, a category mainstream high-street banks have mostly avoided.

A mutual moves into specialist territory

Holiday let mortgages are assessed differently from ordinary buy-to-let loans. Lenders base affordability on projected income across a letting season rather than a single long-term tenancy, and they typically want to see evidence the property can be let commercially, not just occupied by the owner for part of the year. That underwriting takes more work than a standard rental case, which is one reason the pool of lenders willing to do it stays small and tends to be dominated by regional building societies and specialist brokers rather than the big banking groups.

Why lenders are circling this niche now

The UK scrapped the Furnished Holiday Lettings tax regime from April 2025, ending the extra mortgage interest relief and capital allowances that used to set holiday let owners apart from ordinary landlords. That change removed one of the sector's main financial perks, yet it has not stopped owners buying, remortgaging or refinancing holiday let properties. Building societies have been filling gaps left as bigger lenders pulled back from smaller, harder-to-standardize lending niches, and a fresh entrant suggests appetite for holiday let mortgage business has not gone away just because the tax treatment got less generous.

What it means for owners arranging finance

Every additional lender in this space is leverage for the borrower, not the bank. Owners buying a new holiday let, or coming to the end of a fixed rate on an existing one, now have one more name to put in front of a broker when comparing rates, maximum loan-to-value and minimum letting-week requirements. Terms still vary widely between lenders in this market, and mutuals like Hanley Economic often lend only through intermediaries or within a limited geographic footprint rather than taking applications directly, so it is worth checking eligibility before assuming access.

Hanley Economic has not published specific rates or loan-to-value limits for the new product, and none should be assumed until confirmed with the society or a broker. For an owner weighing a purchase or a remortgage, the practical takeaway is narrower but real: the shortlist of lenders who will even consider a holiday let case has gotten one name longer.