What’s changed: Updated 12 October 2026: Lloyds Bank, Halifax and Santander cut selected fixed rates in the week to 9 October, and the averages stayed just under 6%. Earlier, 7 October: the average five-year fix reached 6%. Full update history.
Educational, not advice. This article records which lenders changed their fixed mortgage rates between 4 and 16 September 2026 and explains the mechanics behind the moves. It is general information, not personal financial advice. Savvy Investor Guide is not authorised or regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Nothing here tells you whether to fix, when to fix, or which lender to use.
What this article covers: which lenders raised fixed rates between 4 and 16 September 2026 and by how much where it was disclosed, which lenders were still cutting ten days earlier and have since reversed, why fixed rates moved while Bank Rate did not, the application deadline that has already passed, why two published average rates differ by about half a percentage point, and the dates that could change the picture next.
What it does not cover: whether any of these products is right for you, or what any individual borrower should do. It covers the United Kingdom only. For what is happening to prices themselves, see UK house prices in October 2026.
In short
- Seventeen lenders raised fixed mortgage rates in five working days, 4 to 10 September 2026. Seven went over the weekend of the 4th and the 7th: Virgin Money on the Friday, then Barclays, Santander, NatWest, HSBC UK, Molo and Coventry Building Society on the Monday.
- Ten more followed in the three working days after: TSB, Skipton and Nottingham on the 8th, then Halifax, BM Solutions, Accord, InterBay and the Co-operative Bank on the 9th, then Principality and Nationwide on the 10th.
- A third round followed on 15 and 16 September, and it was bigger. HSBC and Nationwide raised again from the 15th and Santander from the 16th, by up to 0.45 percentage points, taking its 95% loan to value two-year fix to 6.05%. By 16 September Moneyfacts’ average five-year fix was 5.82%, its highest since November 2023.
- Three of them published their numbers. Barclays went up by as much as 18 basis points, Santander by as much as 25, and NatWest by as much as 0.25%.
- The two lenders that were cutting on 26 August have both since raised. TSB cut, then raised thirteen days later. Accord cut by as much as 37 basis points off three-year fixes, then raised fourteen days later.
- Bank Rate did not move at all. It was 3.75% throughout, and on 17 September the Bank of England held it there, by six votes to three. Fixed mortgage rates price off swap rates, not off today’s Bank Rate.
- The deadline has already passed for HSBC. Applications had to be submitted in full by midnight on 4 September to keep the old product codes.
- Nobody has published how much HSBC’s rates went up by. The lender’s notice did not say, and no broker or trade source had filled the gap when this was re-checked on 10 September, six days after the move.
- Moneyfacts said on 4 September that the full effect of the swap-rate move had yet to be priced in. Ten lenders in three days is what that looked like in practice, and Moneyfacts has not yet said the repricing is finished.
The first working days of September produced seven lenders raising mortgage rates, one on the Friday and six on the Monday, all on fixed products, with no change in Bank Rate to point at. Watch one lender and it looks like a single announcement. Watch all of them and it looks like the front edge of a repricing.
It was the front edge. Ten more lenders followed over the next three working days, including all three of the large lenders this article originally could not confirm. Seventeen lenders in five working days, and still no Bank Rate decision to point at. The weekend account below is left as it was written, because a repricing is easier to understand as a sequence than as a total, and the second wave has a section of its own after it.
This is the running record of the lenders raising mortgage rates, and when each one moved. For the mechanism behind it, and the longer story of how this year’s rates have behaved, the deeper explainer is UK mortgage rates turned back up in September 2026.
Lenders raising mortgage rates: who moved, and when
| Lender | Effective | What moved | Size |
|---|---|---|---|
| Virgin Money | 4 September | Selected purchase, remortgage and shared ownership fixes | Up 0.1% to 0.3% |
| Barclays | 7 September | Two-, three- and five-year residential fixes, higher loan to value bands worst hit | Up to 0.18% |
| Santander | 7 September | Residential homemover, first-time buyer, remortgage and buy-to-let fixes | Up to 0.25% |
| NatWest | 7 September | Fixed products including buy-to-let purchase | Up to 0.25% |
| HSBC UK | 7 September | Two- and five-year fixes across residential, remortgage, buy-to-let and international ranges | Not disclosed |
| Molo | 7 September | Two- and five-year buy-to-let fixes, standard and specialist | Not disclosed |
| Coventry Building Society | 7 September | Reported as the entire fixed-rate range, residential and buy-to-let, new and existing borrowers | Not disclosed |
Virgin Money went first, on Friday 4 September. Mortgage Solutions reported increases of between 0.1% and 0.3%: purchase two- and five-year fixes and shared ownership up 0.3%, remortgage two-, five- and ten-year fixes up 0.2%, and ten-year purchase fixes up 0.15%. What gives the move its size is what it undid: “Earlier in the summer, the lender trimmed rates by up to 1.6%, but these latest increases will reverse the majority of these cuts.”
Barclays, Santander and NatWest all moved on Monday 7 September, and unlike the others they published their numbers. Barclays raised rates by as much as 18 basis points. Its two-year fix at 90% loan to value with an £899 fee went from 4.96% to 5.14%, the fee-free equivalent from 5.11% to 5.29%, and the 95% loan to value two-year fix from 5.35% to 5.53%. Five-year products moved by 0.18 percentage points, including the standard 90% loan to value deals at 4.85% to 5.03% and 5.05% to 5.23%. Santander went further, by as much as 25 basis points: its first-time buyer two-year fix at 90% loan to value with a £999 fee rose 0.25 percentage points to 5.1%, the equivalent five-year fix did the same, and the 90% loan to value five-year homemover fix rose 0.25 percentage points to 5.03%. NatWest raised by as much as 0.25%, its largest single move being a two-year buy-to-let purchase fix at 75% loan to value with a £3,999 fee, from 3.93% to 4.18%.
The pattern in those three is worth reading rather than skipping: the higher the loan to value, the larger the increase. Barclays moved its 60% loan to value products least and its 95% products most, and Santander’s smallest disclosed move was 0.05 percentage points at 60% loan to value against 0.25 at 90%. Borrowers with the smallest deposits are absorbing most of this repricing.
HSBC UK and Molo followed on the same Monday. HSBC’s increase runs across two- and five-year fixed rates in its residential ranges at 60% to 95% loan to value, its Energy Efficient Home products, remortgage including cashback, buy-to-let purchase and remortgage, and its international range. Molo raised two- and five-year buy-to-let fixes on both its standard and specialist ranges. Aaron Strutt of Trinity Financial put HSBC’s position plainly to Mortgage Strategy: “HSBC is the first of the big lenders to announce rate hikes following the rise in borrowing costs.”
Coventry Building Society is reported to be raising its whole fixed range from the same Monday, for residential and buy-to-let, new and existing borrowers. This is the thinnest-sourced item in the piece: the only report we found is an AOL syndication of a GB News story from 3 September, and the original sits behind a paywall. The size of the increase was not disclosed and will only show once the products change.
The second wave: ten more lenders, 8 to 10 September
The section above was written on 8 September and said this was the start of a repricing rather than a completed one. That turned out to be the safest prediction in the piece. In the three working days after the weekend, ten more lenders raised fixed rates, and the article you are reading has been extended rather than replaced because the two waves are the same episode.
| Lender | Effective | What moved | Size |
|---|---|---|---|
| TSB | 8 September | All fixed house purchase products, plus three-year fixed remortgage | Up 0.15% |
| Skipton BS | 8 September | Entire fixed range, new and existing customers | Not disclosed |
| Nottingham BS | Not published | Residential, buy-to-let and retirement interest only | Up 0.15% to 0.2% |
| Co-op Bank | 9 September | Whole range replaced, new product codes | Not disclosed |
| Halifax | 9 September | Selected home mover and first-time buyer fixes, plus one remortgage product | Up to 0.12% |
| BM Solutions | 9 September | Personal ownership buy-to-let and let-to-buy fixes | Up to 0.29% |
| Accord | 9 September | All residential ranges, plus buy-to-let new business | Up to 0.25% |
| InterBay | 9 September | Buy-to-let, withdrawn and relaunched higher | Not disclosed |
| Principality | 10 September | Selected residential, buy-to-let and holiday let | Up to 0.18% |
| Nationwide | 10 September | Selected fixed and tracker rates, new and existing members | Up to 0.20% |
Tuesday 8 September belonged to the mid-sized lenders. TSB raised every fixed house purchase product by 0.15% and its three-year fixed remortgages by the same, with existing applications having to be submitted by the end of Monday to hold the old price. Skipton raised its whole fixed range for new business and existing customers, withdrawing the outgoing products at 9pm on the Monday night. Nottingham Building Society moved on residential, standard buy-to-let, limited company buy-to-let and retirement interest-only, by 0.15% to 0.2%. It announced the change on 7 September and never published an effective date, which is why that row of the table says so rather than guessing one. The Co-operative Bank for Intermediaries pulled its range at 5pm and relaunched on the Wednesday with new product codes and end dates pushed out to the end of February.
Wednesday 9 September was the day the largest lender in the “could not confirm” list gave way. Halifax Intermediaries raised selected home mover and first-time buyer fixes by up to 0.12%. The table above records that headline figure; the largest single Halifax move was bigger and narrower, 0.18% on one product, the 60% loan to value two-year remortgage fix with a £1,999 fee. Product transfers and further advances were left alone. On the same day BM Solutions raised personal ownership buy-to-let and let-to-buy by up to 0.29%, the largest single increase anywhere in this episode; Accord raised residential lending by 0.15% and buy-to-let new business by 0.25%; and InterBay withdrew its buy-to-let range at 5pm the evening before and relaunched it higher.
One caveat on Accord, because two trade outlets do not agree. Mortgage Strategy reported the announcement on 8 September as a 0.15% residential rise and a 0.25% buy-to-let new business rise effective the next day. Mortgage Solutions, reporting on 9 September, described the buy-to-let increases as 0.16% at 60% to 75% loan to value and 0.1% at 80%. Those may be the same repricing described at different levels of detail, or two separate moves. The table above uses the announcement figures because they carry an effective date. The discrepancy is left visible rather than resolved, because resolving it would mean guessing.
Thursday 10 September closed the list. Principality Intermediaries raised selected residential, buy-to-let and holiday let products by up to 0.18%, with residential fixes at 65% loan to value taking the largest rise and the outgoing range withdrawn at 5pm the previous evening. Nationwide raised selected fixed and tracker rates by up to 0.20% across new business and existing member ranges. Aaron Strutt of Trinity Financial put the practical effect of the Nationwide move plainly: “Nationwide’s cheapest two-year fix is going up from 4.48% to 4.63%, which is frustrating because it was one of the standout best buy rates and popular with borrowers looking for competitively priced shorter-term deals.”
Strutt had called it two days earlier, on the day Halifax moved: “We have been waiting for Halifax to raise its rates, I suspect Nationwide will be the next big lender to push up its prices.” He was right within 48 hours. His wider reading is worth keeping next to the table, because it cuts against the drama of a seventeen-lender list: “Many of the rate hikes we have seen so far have been smaller than expected and there are still a fair few two, three and five-year fixes priced between 4.5% and 4.6%, while Barclays still has its 3.99% two-year tracker and other lenders are offering tracker rates that are only marginally more expensive.”
All three lenders we could not confirm have now moved
On 8 September this article carried a section headed “What we could not confirm”. It named three large lenders, Nationwide, Halifax and Skipton, said that no dated increase could be found for any of them inside that weekend, and then made a point of separating two claims that are easy to blur:
That is a search result, not a fact about those lenders. Rate changes are announced to brokers first and reach the trade press unevenly, so “no increase found” and “no increase happened” are different statements, and only the first one is supported here.
Within 72 hours all three had raised: Skipton on 8 September, Halifax on 9 September, Nationwide on 10 September. The hedge was the right call and the reason it was right is worth keeping. The absence in the trade press on 7 September was real, and it meant nothing about what those lenders were about to do. A lender that has not appeared in a round-up is a lender nobody has written about yet, which is a fact about journalism rather than about pricing.
The one figure that did survive from that section is the Nationwide history: the most recent confirmable Nationwide increase before this week was in March 2026, when it raised almost all its fixes by up to 25 basis points. Six months of not moving, then 0.20% in a single day.
The third round: HSBC, Nationwide and Santander, 15 and 16 September
The first two waves were one episode. A week later the largest lenders went round again, and this time the increases were bigger. Aaron Strutt of Trinity Financial told Mortgage Solutions on Monday 14 September: “I can’t remember the last time five of the big six lenders hiked their rates on the same day.”
| Lender | Effective | What moved | Size |
|---|---|---|---|
| HSBC UK | 15 September | All two- and five-year fixes and two-year trackers at every loan to value, residential and buy-to-let, plus product transfers | Not disclosed |
| Nationwide | 15 September | First-time buyer, home mover, remortgage, switcher and additional borrowing fixes | Up to 0.30% |
| Santander | 16 September | Residential and buy-to-let fixes | Up to 0.45% |
Santander’s is the largest single move in this article. From Wednesday 16 September its fee-free 90% loan to value two- and three-year first-time buyer fixes went up by 0.45 percentage points to 5.8%, and its 95% two-year fix to 6.05%. Buy-to-let fixes rose by 0.4 to 0.45 points. On Strutt’s reading, it left Santander with no rates below 5% at all. Nationwide, which had moved on 10 September, went again from the 15th by up to 0.30%, which puts its first-time buyer range between 4.64% and 5.74%. HSBC raised every two- and five-year fix and every two-year tracker at every loan to value from the same day, and once more did not publish the size.
The averages have now caught up. On 15 September Moneyfacts put the average two-year fix at 5.73%, up from 4.84% at the start of March, and the average five-year fix at 5.78%, and said NatWest, Santander, HSBC, Lloyds Bank and TSB had all raised selected fixes for the second time this month. The next day its average five-year fix reached 5.82%, “its highest point since 8 November 2023”. Against the 4 September averages in the table further down, 5.6% and 5.64%, that is the lender moves above feeding through.
Ten days earlier, two lenders were cutting
This is the part that makes the week a story rather than a trend line. On 26 August, Mortgage Strategy reported Accord cutting three-year fixes by 37 basis points, five-year fixes by 5 basis points and two-year fixes by 15 to 20 basis points, with TSB cutting two-, three- and five-year house purchase fixes by up to 20 basis points and three-year remortgages by 15.
So in about ten days the direction reversed, with no Bank Rate decision in between. That tells you something about this market: a lender cutting today is reporting last week’s funding costs, not making a forecast.
Both of those lenders have since raised, and the gap is the point. TSB announced cuts of up to 20 basis points on house purchase fixes on 26 August and raised every fixed house purchase product by 0.15% on 8 September, thirteen days later. Accord announced cuts of up to 37 basis points on 26 August and raised residential lending by 0.15% and buy-to-let new business by 0.25% on 9 September, fourteen days later. Neither lender changed its mind about anything. Both were passing on a funding cost that moved underneath them, in both directions, inside a fortnight.
Bank Rate has not moved, and that is the point
The Bank of England’s published Bank Rate is 3.75%, and it has not changed through any of this. It did not change on 17 September either, when the Monetary Policy Committee held it by six votes to three, with three members voting to raise it to 4%. The next decision is on Thursday 5 November 2026.
Fixed mortgage rates are not priced off today’s Bank Rate. They are priced off swap rates, which are the wholesale market’s view of where Bank Rate will average over the term of the loan. When that expectation shifts, fixed rates move whether or not the Bank has done anything. Caitlyn Eastell, a personal finance analyst at Moneyfacts, described the trigger for this move as swap rates that “soared to 30-day highs” over a four-day week.
Her second point matters more for the days ahead. Moneyfacts’ position is that “the full effect of swap rate movements has yet to be priced in”, which is the trade’s way of saying more lenders are likely to follow. The full chain from gilt yields to swap rates to the rate on a mortgage offer is set out in the companion explainer.
The deadline that has already gone
Lenders do not usually reprice without a cut-off, and HSBC’s has passed. Mortgage Soup’s report of the notice is specific: “The deadline for submitting applications in full to secure existing product codes was midnight on 4 September.” An application that was complete before that point holds the old pricing. One submitted after it does not.
The same notice also drew a line: “No other interest rates are changing under the notice.” Tracker products, standard variable rates and anything outside the listed fixed ranges are untouched by this particular change.
Lenders generally let a borrower reserve a fixed rate some months ahead of completion, and existing customers can usually book a product transfer before their current deal ends. The windows differ by lender, and none of this week’s sources stated HSBC’s, so that is one for the lender or a broker. This article cannot put a number on it.
Nobody has published HSBC’s new numbers
That is unusual, and it deserves saying plainly. Both trade reports of the HSBC move say the notice “does not specify the size of the increases or the new rates”. As of 7 September no broker or trade outlet had published a before-and-after table.
HSBC’s own remortgage rate page does show live rates. What it does not show is an effective date, so the page alone cannot tell you which figures are new and which were already there. A rate quoted last week, set against the rate on the site today, is two numbers of unstated vintage. Until a lender notice or a broker publishes the basis-point change, the direction is known and the size is not.
Why two published “average” rates differ by half a point
If you have looked up the average mortgage rate this week you may have found two very different answers, and both were correct.
| Source | Average two-year fix | Average five-year fix | As at |
|---|---|---|---|
| Moneyfacts | 5.6% | 5.64% | 4 September 2026 |
| Podium, published by Rightmove | 5.09% | 5.11% | 5 September 2026 |
The gap is about half a percentage point and it is methodology, not error. The two providers average different panels of products. A figure that includes every product on the market, at every loan to value and with every fee structure, sits higher than one weighted towards the deals a typical borrower is actually shown. Moneyfacts separately publishes a single blended average new mortgage rate, which stood at 5.57% on 4 September, up from 5.55%.
The practical consequence is that an average is useful for direction and close to useless for a decision. Both series show the same thing this week, which is a small rise: Moneyfacts’ two-year average moved a single basis point, from 5.59% to 5.6%, and its five-year average moved one basis point to 5.64%. The lender moves above are much larger than that, which tells you the averages have not caught up yet.
The dates that could change this
- Wednesday 28 October 2026: the Autumn Budget. Gilt yields have been volatile through the run-up, and gilts sit upstream of swap rates.
- Thursday 5 November 2026: the next Bank of England rate decision, after the hold on 17 September. A change in Bank Rate is not what moves fixed rates directly, but the accompanying language moves the expectations that swap rates are built on.
- Whenever the next lender moves: which, on Moneyfacts’ reading of how much of the swap-rate rise is still unpriced, was the most likely of the three to happen first. It duly did, ten times over, between 8 and 10 September, and again on 15 and 16 September. It remains the most likely of the three to happen again.
Common questions
My mortgage offer came through last week. Does this affect it?
A formal mortgage offer is issued at a stated rate and for a stated period. A lender repricing its new-business range does not reach back into an offer already made. The group affected by a repricing is people who have not yet applied, plus anyone whose application was incomplete at the cut-off. For HSBC that cut-off was midnight on 4 September.
Bank Rate is 3.75% and my fixed rate quote is over 5%. Why the gap?
Because a fixed rate is not a mark-up on today’s Bank Rate. Fixing for five years means the lender needs funding at a known cost for five years, and it buys that in the swap market at a price set by where the market thinks Bank Rate will average over that period, plus the lender’s own margin and costs. Every one of those components can move while Bank Rate stands still.
Does a lender raising rates mean the Bank of England is about to raise Bank Rate?
Not on its own. A lender repricing tells you the wholesale cost of funding has moved, which reflects what the market currently expects. Market expectations and MPC decisions are different things, and the market has been wrong in both directions before. The strongest evidence is TSB and Accord: both cut on 26 August and both raised within a fortnight, and Bank Rate was 3.75% on every one of those days.
Is this the same as the rise reported in July?
No, and Barclays is the clearest illustration of why. Barclays, NatWest and Halifax all raised rates in late July 2026, rates then came back down through August with cuts still being announced on 26 August, and Barclays raised again on 7 September. Mortgage Strategy also reports that Barclays “last increased rates on 25 August”, which if correct makes September its third rise since late July. Halifax, which raised in July, has now raised again on 9 September. The September episode has a separate trigger from the July one, and the honest summary is that this is a market which has changed direction several times in a single year, which is why a week’s news is a poor guide to where rates settle.
Why does buy-to-let keep appearing separately?
Because it is priced separately, and often by more. HSBC, Molo and Coventry all listed buy-to-let ranges in the first wave, and in the second the two largest increases anywhere were both buy-to-let: BM Solutions at up to 0.29% on personal ownership buy-to-let and let-to-buy, and Accord at 0.25% on buy-to-let new business against 0.15% on residential. Buy-to-let products often carry a different fee structure from residential ones, and a large arrangement fee can buy the headline rate down a long way, so a buy-to-let headline rate and a residential one are not directly comparable numbers.
Sources
- Mortgage Solutions, “Virgin Money ups mortgage rates”, 3 September 2026
- Mortgage Solutions, “Barclays, Santander, NatWest and HSBC announce rate increases: round-up”, 7 September 2026
- Mortgage Strategy, “HSBC UK and Molo to hike rates from next week”, 4 September 2026
- Mortgage Soup, “HSBC UK to raise rates across residential and buy-to-let ranges”, 6 September 2026
- Mortgage Strategy, “Soaring swap rates bump up mortgage prices: Moneyfacts”, 4 September 2026
- Mortgage Strategy, “Accord and TSB trim rates by up to 37bps”, 26 August 2026
- AOL, syndicating GB News, “UK building society announces change for customers from Monday”, 3 September 2026
- Mortgage Strategy, “TSB and Barclays among latest lenders to increase rates”, 7 September 2026
- The Intermediary, “TSB to increase selected residential mortgage rates by 0.15%”, 7 September 2026
- The Intermediary, “Skipton BS and The Co-operative Bank among latest lenders to update mortgage ranges”, 7 September 2026
- Mortgage Strategy, “Halifax, BM Solutions, Accord and InterBay push rates up”, 8 September 2026
- The Intermediary, “Principality to increase mortgage rates by up to 0.18%”, 9 September 2026
- The Intermediary, “Nationwide increases selected fixed mortgage rates”, 9 September 2026
- Mortgage Solutions, “Nationwide, Principality, Accord and TSB all increase rates: round-up”, 9 September 2026
- Bank of England, “Monetary Policy Committee dates for 2026 and 2027”
- HSBC UK, remortgage rates
- Rightmove, “What are the current UK mortgage rates?”
- Mortgage Solutions, “Mortgage rate ‘shock’ as HSBC, Santander and Nationwide hike rates”, 14 September 2026
- Mortgage Solutions, “Second wave of hikes among ‘growing concerns surrounding inflationary pressures’: Moneyfacts”, 15 September 2026
- Moneyfactscompare, “This week’s top mortgage deals explained”, 16 September 2026
- Bank of England, Monetary Policy Summary, September 2026
- Mortgage Strategy, “Mortgage rates edge closer to 6% as lenders continue to reprice”, 25 September 2026
- Mortgage Strategy, “Barclays pulls market-leading deals and hikes rates by up to 30bps”, 28 September 2026
- Mortgage Strategy, “Foundation and Kensington raise rates”, 29 September 2026
- Mortgage Solutions, “Nationwide and Virgin up rates: round-up”, 29 September 2026
- Mortgage Strategy, “Fixed rate prices rise again despite major lender cuts: Moneyfacts”, 9 October 2026
Update history: 12 October back to 18 September 2026
Update, 12 October 2026. The first cuts from the largest lenders, and the averages have barely moved. Moneyfacts’ Rate Watch of 9 October put the average two-year fix at 5.97% and the average five-year fix at 5.99%. Both were a little higher than a week earlier, and both were just below the 5.98% and 6% reached on 5 October. Several large lenders cut that week: Lloyds Bank and Halifax by up to 0.10 percentage points on selected fixed rates, Santander by up to 0.25 and Yorkshire Building Society by up to 0.53, with Accord and Foundation lower too. Others were still raising, among them Coventry Building Society, Kensington, and the Leek and Melton building societies. Caitlyn Eastell of Moneyfacts said lenders “appear to be taking a more measured approach to pricing than they did during September’s period of rapid rate adjustments”, and that “it may be too early to tell whether rates have peaked or have more room to move.” The body of this article remains the record of 4 to 16 September. Source: Mortgage Strategy, 9 October 2026.
Update, 7 October 2026. The average five-year fix has reached 6%. On 5 October Moneyfacts put the average five-year fix at 6%, the highest since late September 2023, and the average two-year fix at 5.98%, up from 5.96% on 2 October and its highest since mid-December 2023. Fixed deals priced below 5% have almost gone: there were 1,494 at the start of September and nine on 5 October. Rachel Springall of Moneyfacts said: “This shows just how quickly the mortgage market has shifted for borrowers searching for the lowest rates.” Not every move since has been upward. Mortgage Solutions reported on 6 October that Gen H had cut most of its fee-free two-year fixes by between 0.14 and 0.30 percentage points, with its chief distribution officer, Sara Palmer, saying swap rates “have come down ever so slightly”. The body of this article remains the record of 4 to 16 September. Sources: Moneyfacts, 5 October 2026; Mortgage Solutions, 5 October 2026; Mortgage Solutions, 6 October 2026.
Update, 1 October 2026. Rates kept rising to the end of September, with a few cuts along the way. Moneyfacts’ Rate Watch of 25 September put the average two-year fix at 5.92%, “its highest level in over two years and up from 5.84% last week”, and the average five-year fix at 5.94%. That week’s changes were mostly rises, among them HSBC, Halifax, Lloyds Bank, Leeds, Nottingham and Hodge, while NatWest and Gen H cut selected fixed rates. Another round followed. On 29 September Barclays raised 85 products by up to 0.30 percentage points, taking its 4.75% two-year fix to 5.05% and its 4.93% five-year fix to 5.03%, and Foundation and Kensington raised rates the same day. Nationwide raised fixed rates from 30 September and Virgin Money raised again, TSB announced higher product transfer rates, and Principality raised its product transfer rates from 1 October. By 29 September the average two-year fix had edged up to 5.93%. The body of this article remains the record of 4 to 16 September. Sources: Mortgage Strategy, 25 September 2026; 28 September; 29 September; 29 September (TSB); 30 September; Mortgage Solutions, 29 September 2026.
Update, 19 September 2026. A third round of increases, and the averages caught up. HSBC and Nationwide raised fixed rates again from 15 September and Santander from 16 September, by up to 0.45 percentage points. On 16 September Moneyfacts put the average five-year fix at 5.82%, its highest point since 8 November 2023. The article now covers the third round in its own section, and its references to the 17 September decision now describe the hold, with 5 November as the next date. Sources: Mortgage Solutions, 14 September 2026; Moneyfactscompare, 16 September 2026.
Update, 18 September 2026. The 17 September decision this article pointed to has been made: the Bank of England held Bank Rate at 3.75%, by six votes to three, with three members voting to raise it to 4%. Lenders did not wait for it. By 15 September NatWest, Santander, HSBC, Lloyds Bank and TSB had raised selected fixes for a second time this month, and Moneyfacts put the average two-year fix at 5.73% and the five-year at 5.78%. The mechanics below are unchanged: fixed rates follow swap rates, which is why they moved while Bank Rate did not. Sources: Bank of England; Mortgage Solutions, 15 September 2026.