What is the interest rate lock period in construction financing?

Yes, ING is strange. For an old loan, I also get 1% there, since I then want to rent it out. But I wouldn't have thought that they still allow that for new ones.
And more than 30% equity is definitely a lot on average for all real estate financings.
That's good, I'm glad you got that.

Why strange?? They are doing the customer a favor who doesn't want to repay anything in an absolute low-interest phase and make good money doing so

Customer experience - Check
Interest income - Check
Follow-up financing secured - check

I would say very smart

If you (almost) don’t amortize in these nearly interest-free times, the risk is high that you won’t be able to handle the follow-up financing at all. Then the bank won’t get it either and thus won’t get interest any longer. Maybe they don’t care, but in the long run (and that’s the only way banks make good money) that’s not sensible.
In the case of ING, in my opinion, it’s actually inconsistent because they only apply the standard when granting loans and then deviate from the (market-standard) standard in terms of the amortization option.


I find it strange because ING actually operates almost fully automatically and uses an algorithm to evaluate loan requests, where even their own employees can’t say why a request was rejected and thus everything except the absolute standard is basically rejected. So I find it even stranger that they then act more customer-friendly than the standard in terms of the repayment rate (see above).

That they can offer loans to many simply and cheaply, I definitely don’t want to deny. And that this can possibly be positive from the customer’s point of view neither.

I find it even stranger when they act more customer-friendly than the standard regarding the repayment rate (see above).

You have to occupy some niche :cool:

I don't find anything strange or unusual about that. At least it also matches my experience (2020) that there were plenty of banks and offers where <2% repayment was possible. By the way, my brother also financed a condominium at the beginning of 2020 (in addition to the house) and was surprised/complained that everyone demanded at least 2% repayment. I, on the other hand, would have absolutely no problem financing the new building with less than 2%. So whether individual conditions were decisive for that, I don't know, but I don't think so.

: According to the statement of three independent financial advisors at the beginning of 2020, it was more like what your brother experienced. It must have been due to the conditions if you had different experiences than your brother. Or did you only ask different banks or are your conditions absolutely identical? That the ING is strange, I have also concluded from other circumstances. You can find that completely normal, that’s also ok.

: According to statements from three independent financial advisors at the beginning of 2020, it was more like what your brother experienced. It must have been due to the framework conditions if you had different experiences than your brother. Or did you only ask different banks or are your framework conditions absolutely identical?

No, they were not identical and completely independent of each other. However, I claim to have targeted significantly more banks than he did back then, so in my case there may have been more options left that also offered <2% repayment.

That ING is strange, I also determined this by other circumstances. You can find that quite normal, that’s also okay.

It has nothing to do with "strange" or "normal". I just wanted to express that ING offers nothing special here compared to many others :) By the way, we also start below 2% at Volksbank and have the free option (I think 5x) to change the repayment rate.