From April this year, the UK began phasing out mortgage interest tax relief on buy-to-let properties by April 2020.
The move will potentially push over 400,000 UK-resident lower-rate tax payers into a higher bracket, as well as impacting on higher rate tax payers.
This could also hit the UK tax bracket for expats with investment property, says Skipton.
However, since launched its range of buy-to-let mortgages in 2014, the lender has seen demand for its products sky-rocket, writing over £190m (€215m, $246m) of business to expats across 900 mortgages.
In the year to May 2017, the lender revealed it has had more than double the number of enquiries for expat mortgages than during the same period in 2016.
This included a 124% rise in enquires from British expats in the United Arab Emirates, a 118% increase from British expats in Switzerland, and a 162% increase from British expats in Hong Kong.
“There have been a number of measures over the past few years that have affected overseas investors who own UK buy-to-let properties,” said Nigel Pascoe, director of lending, Skipton International.
“Buy-to-let remains a popular long-term investment for British expats and we don’t expect the phasing out of mortgage interest rate relief to change this.”
Tax guide
Skipton has now launched a guide to help expat buy-to-let investors understand how the new changes to mortgage relief will affect them.
In April, the lender unveiled a new three-year fixed rate offshore savings account, promising to pay an interest rate of 1.6% gross per annum.
At the same time, it also launched a new two-year offshore savings bond, which pays 1.4% gross per annum.
