Bank Rate, Mortgage Approvals and Your Buy-to-Let: What the November 2026 Numbers Mean for Landlords

In short

• Bank Rate is now 4%. On 5 November 2026 the Bank of England raised Bank Rate by 0.25 percentage points, from 3.75%. Catherine L Mann voted against, preferring a rise of 0.5 points. The next decision is due on 17 December 2026. The mortgage and inflation figures below were published before this decision, so read them as the starting point.
• Mortgage approvals for house purchase fell to 53,400 in September 2026, down from 54,800 in August and from 65,900 in September 2025. That is about 19% lower than a year earlier.
• The effective rate on newly drawn mortgages rose to 4.63% in September, from 4.19% a year earlier.
• CPI inflation rose to 3.5% in the 12 months to September, up from 3.1% in August.
• What to do this week: list every loan you hold, find out whether it is a tracker, a standard variable rate or a fix, note the date each fix ends, and run your portfolio through a stress test at one percentage point higher. The free Deal Analyser does the sums.

England only. General information, not financial, tax or legal advice. Bank of England, Bank Rate decision and Monetary Policy Summary and Minutes (November 2026). Checked on 5 November 2026: the decision section was updated that day after the announcement; other figures are as checked on 4 November 2026.

Why this week matters to landlords

Most landlords borrow. Even those who bought outright often hold a mortgage on a later purchase, or may need to remortgage to release cash for repairs, an energy-efficiency upgrade or a deposit on the next property. So when the cost of borrowing moves, it reaches a landlord twice: first in the monthly interest bill, and then in the market the landlord sells into or rents out in.

Three official releases landed within a few days of each other:

1. The Bank of England's Money and Credit statistics, published on 29 October 2026, which report how many mortgages were approved for house purchase in September.
2. The Office for National Statistics' Consumer Price Inflation bulletin, published on 21 October 2026, which reports CPI for September.
3. The Bank of England's Bank Rate decision, announced on 5 November 2026, at which the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted on the interest rate that underpins much of the UK's borrowing.

Read together they tell a consistent story: borrowing is getting more expensive, fewer people are getting approved to buy, and inflation has moved the wrong way. They do not tell you what will happen to your property, and nothing in this guide is a forecast. What they do give you is a reason to check your own numbers now, before a lender or a calendar forces the question.

What the Bank of England reported on mortgage approvals

On 29 October 2026 the Bank published its Money and Credit statistics for September. The headline lines for mortgages were:

• Net mortgage approvals for house purchase decreased to 53,400 in September, from 54,800 in August. The Bank describes approvals as an indicator of future borrowing.
• Approvals were below the average of around 58,800 over the previous six months.
• Net borrowing of mortgage debt by individuals decreased to £3.9 billion in September, from £4.2 billion in August, below the previous six-month average of £4.9 billion.
• The "effective" interest rate, the actual interest paid on newly drawn mortgages, increased to 4.63% in September, from 4.60% in August.

The figures above are quoted from the Bank's release. The comparisons below are our own arithmetic from the Bank's published numbers.

Working from those numbers:

• Approvals are 12,500 lower than a year earlier, a fall of about 19% (12,500 divided by 65,900).
• Approvals are 1,400 lower than the month before, a fall of about 2.6%.
• Approvals are about 5,400, or 9%, below the six-month average of 58,800.
• The effective rate on new mortgages is 0.44 percentage points higher than a year earlier (4.63% minus 4.19%).

One caution before reading too much into a single month. The Bank's own wording uses the six-month average as a yardstick because individual months move around. A fall of 2.6% month on month is modest. The larger story is the gap to a year ago and to the recent average. It is also worth knowing that the same release a year earlier, on 29 October 2025, described the September 2025 effective rate of 4.19% as the lowest since January 2023, "continuing the downward trend observed since March 2025". The trend has since reversed: the rate you would have paid on a newly drawn mortgage a year ago was lower than today's.

What "net approvals" and "effective rate" mean

Two terms in the Bank's release trip people up.

Net approvals means approvals after cancellations. It counts mortgages that lenders agreed to for house purchase, not completed sales and not remortgages. It leads sales because a buyer is approved before the purchase completes. It covers all house purchase, not only buy-to-let, so it is a signal of the whole market rather than the landlord sector.

Effective rate is the actual interest rate paid on new mortgage borrowing, averaged across borrowers. It is not a product rate you can pick off a lender's website, and it is not a buy-to-let rate. It blends all the fixed, tracker and variable deals that were newly drawn in the month. Landlord rates are usually quoted separately by lenders and brokers, and depend on loan-to-value, the rent, and whether you borrow personally or through a company. Use the effective rate as a barometer of the direction of travel, and ask a broker for the actual rate on your case.

What inflation did

The ONS reported that CPI rose by 3.5% in the 12 months to September 2026, up from 3.1% in August. Transport, particularly motor fuels, made the largest upward contribution to the change in the annual rate. The detail matters for landlords for three reasons.

First, the ONS table shows the services index up at 3.7% (from 3.4%) and core CPI, which strips out food, energy, alcohol and tobacco, at 2.8% (from 2.6%). Central banks watch these measures because they are less driven by one-off swings in fuel. Second, the housing and household services division rose at 5.3% annually, from 4.9%. Third, higher inflation is the reason the Bank of England is weighing a rise in Bank Rate: its job is to keep inflation low and stable.

The ONS sets out how it measures this. We rely on its published release rather than on press summaries, and so should you.

The 5 November decision: what the Bank decided

What the Bank announced on 5 November 2026, from its Bank Rate page and its November Monetary Policy Summary and Minutes, both opened on the day:

• The MPC raised Bank Rate by 0.25 percentage points, from 3.75% to 4%.
• Catherine L Mann voted against, preferring to raise Bank Rate by 0.5 percentage points, to 4.25%. The full vote is in the Bank's minutes; we quote only the dissent we have read there.
• The Bank said conflict in the Middle East has kept energy prices high and volatile. Inflation is 3.5%, and the Bank expects it to rise to about 5% by mid-2027.
• The Governor said the increase should not be seen as the first in an inevitable long sequence of rises, but that unless the conflict is resolved it does not seem likely to be the last.
• The next announcement is due on 17 December 2026.

For context: at its September meeting, on 17 September 2026, the MPC maintained Bank Rate at 3.75%. According to the House of Commons Library's briefing on interest rates, the September vote was six members for no change and three for raising rates by 0.25 of a percentage point. Press reports on 2 November (Reuters, BBC) had expected a rise to 4%; the Bank's decision matched that expectation. Those reports were journalists' accounts, not the Bank's statement.

What it means in simple arithmetic. A 0.25-point rise adds £250 a year of interest for every £100,000 borrowed on a loan that follows Bank Rate directly, such as a tracker, before any change a lender makes to its own margin (0.25% x £100,000 = £250, or about £20.83 a month). Fixed-rate loans do not change until they end, but lenders price new fixes with Bank Rate and market expectations in mind. The Bank's decision does not tell you your own lender's rate: check your own mortgage terms.

How a Bank Rate change reaches a landlord

Not every landlord feels a change at the same time. What happens depends on the type of loan.

Tracker mortgages. A tracker follows Bank Rate, usually at a fixed margin above it. If the Bank raises Bank Rate by 0.25 of a percentage point, your rate normally rises by the same amount, after whatever notice your lender is required to give. Check your offer document for the margin and for any floor that stops the rate falling below a set level.

Standard variable rate (SVR). An SVR is set by the lender, not by the Bank. Lenders often move SVRs when Bank Rate moves, but they are free to move them at other times and by other amounts. If a fixed deal has ended and you have drifted onto the SVR, you are exposed to whatever the lender decides.

Fixed rate. A fixed rate does not change during the fixed period, whatever Bank Rate does. The risk is at the end: the deal you can get when it expires reflects the market's expectations at that time. Landlords with several fixes ending in the same quarter carry the largest "cliff" risk.

Interest-only versus repayment. Many buy-to-let loans are interest-only, so the monthly cost is simply the loan multiplied by the rate, divided by twelve. That makes the arithmetic easy and the sensitivity obvious: every 0.25 of a percentage point on £100,000 is £250 a year.

Remortgaging for a refinance. If you are planning a buy, refurbish, rent and refinance strategy, the refinance is priced when you do it, not when you bought. A higher rate at that point lowers the loan a given rent will support, and can leave more of your cash in the deal.

Worked examples with real arithmetic

These examples are illustrations. They use round numbers and interest-only loans. They are not rates you will be offered.

Example 1: what 0.25 of a percentage point costs

A one-point rise is four times those amounts: £1,500 a year on a £150,000 loan, or £125 a month.

Example 2: the gap between last year's and this year's effective rate

Apply the Bank's September effective rates to a £150,000 interest-only loan, purely to show the size of the movement:

That is an average across all borrowers, not what a particular landlord paid, but it shows that a movement that sounds small in percentage points is a real monthly cost.

Example 3: a composite landlord

Priya, a fictional composite, owns three rental homes. Two are on fixed rates ending in March and June next year, and one is on a tracker. Her total borrowing is £430,000, all interest-only: £150,000 on the tracker and £140,000 on each of the other two. Her rents cover the interest comfortably today.

A 0.25-point rise costs her £375 a year on the tracker straight away. When the two fixes end next year, she will need to refinance £280,000. If the rates then available are one point higher than her current fixes, that adds £2,800 a year (£280,000 times 1%). Combined with the tracker, her costs rise by £3,175 a year, or about £265 a month. Priya's rents do not rise by the same amount automatically. She must raise rent through the proper process, and only where the market and her tenants' circumstances allow.

Priya does three things. She lists each loan with its type and end date. She asks a broker what she would be offered today if she refinanced early. She checks that every property would still cover its interest at one point higher, using a stress test.

Stress-test your own portfolio

A stress test asks a simple question: if costs go up and income goes down, does the property still wash its face? You can do it on paper in ten minutes, or use the free Deal Analyser, which runs five stress scenarios side by side.

The method is the same either way:

1. Write down the rent you actually collect in a year, allowing for empty months. Do not use the headline monthly rent times twelve.
2. Add up the yearly running costs: management, repairs allowance, insurance, certificates and anything else you pay regularly.
3. Work out the yearly mortgage interest at your current rate.
4. Subtract costs and interest from rent. That is your net cash before tax.
5. Repeat at the stressed rates: one percentage point higher, and with one extra empty month, and with rent ten percent lower.
6. Compare the result with your cash buffer. If a bad year would use all of it, the property has no safety margin.

In the Deal Analyser's example deal, which uses made-up numbers for a refurbished property with a £195,000 interest-only refinance loan at 5.5%, the base case leaves £552 a year before tax. Raise the rate by one percentage point and that becomes a loss of £1,398 a year. Take 10% off the rent instead and it becomes a loss of £666. One extra empty month turns it into a loss of £555. The point is not the specific numbers: it is how quickly a thin margin disappears. If your own deal looks like that, you want to know before the lender or the market tells you.

Lenders do a version of this test too. Many buy-to-let lenders check that the rent covers the interest by a set margin, at a rate higher than the one you will actually pay. They set their own tests and the figures change, so ask your broker for the current one rather than relying on a number from an article.

What the data does not say

It is worth being plain about the limits, because trending topics invite overreach.

Approvals are not prices. The Bank describes approvals as an indicator of future borrowing. Fewer approvals can mean fewer sales, but they do not by themselves tell you whether prices will rise or fall. We do not forecast prices here.

These are whole-market figures. The approvals series covers all mortgages for house purchase. It does not isolate buy-to-let, and it does not tell you what landlords as a group are doing.

Effective rates are averages. They blend many products and borrowers. Your rate depends on your loan-to-value, the rent, your structure and your lender.

A single month is one data point. The six-month average and the year-on-year comparison give better context than the monthly change.

We have not tied any specific overseas policy decision to a UK figure. Global bond markets do influence UK borrowing costs, and commentators often link UK rates to developments abroad, including in the United States. But the Bank of England and ONS releases quoted here do not attribute these particular figures to any one foreign decision, and we only publish what we can source. If you read a claim that a named overseas announcement caused a specific UK mortgage figure, ask where the evidence is. What you can say safely is that UK mortgage rates respond to a mix of Bank Rate, inflation, lenders' funding costs and market expectations, and that you cannot control any of them.

Rents, tenants and the market you let into

Falling approvals matter to landlords in a second way. If fewer people are approved to buy, more households stay in rented homes for longer, which can support demand for rentals. That is an inference, not a measured result, and the effect depends on the area, the type of property and the tenant's circumstances. At the same time, your tenants face the same cost pressures as you: CPI at 3.5% means everyday costs are rising, and the ONS shows housing and household services rising faster than the headline rate.

Practical consequences for landlords:

• Check your rent against the evidence before you raise it. The official figures by council area in our guide to official rent figures show what tenants in your area actually pay.
• Use the correct process. A rent increase in England has to follow the statutory route, with the right form and notice, once a year and not in the first year of a tenancy. Get it wrong and the increase can be void. A wrong date costs more than the extra rent is worth.
• Do not let arrears drift. If a tenant starts to fall behind as costs rise, an early conversation is cheaper than a possession claim. Our guide to Section 8 Ground 8 explains what serious arrears are and what can make a claim fail.
• Keep your property compliant. Lenders and insurers ask about certificates, and a lapsed one is the wrong thing to discover while refinancing. Our guide to registering your rental property covers the landlord register.

Tax: where mortgage interest fits

Mortgage interest on a residential let is no longer simply deducted from rental income for individual landlords. HMRC's guidance explains that the relief for finance costs is restricted to the basic rate of Income Tax: the reduction is the basic-rate value, currently 20%, of the lower of the finance costs and certain other amounts. The tax reduction cannot be used to create a tax refund. For many landlords, that means a rate rise increases the interest you pay without increasing the tax relief by the same proportion, particularly if you pay tax at a higher rate.

Our Section 24 guide sets out how the restriction works, including the rate changes announced from April 2027. If you hold property personally and your rent plus other income is rising, check your own position with an accountant. Keeping clean records of interest paid, month by month, makes that conversation faster and cheaper.

What to do this week: a landlord's checklist

1. List every loan. For each property record the lender, the balance, whether it is a tracker, SVR or fixed rate, the current rate and the margin if it tracks.
2. Find the end date of each fix. Put the dates in a calendar with reminders at six months, three months and one month before. A fix that ends unnoticed can drop you onto the lender's SVR.
3. Check for early repayment charges on each fixed deal, so that you know the cost of moving early.
4. Ask a broker what you would be offered today. Compare it with your current rate. Brokers are regulated and can see lender criteria you cannot.
5. Run the stress test at one point higher, with an extra empty month and a 10% rent drop. Note which properties would not cover their interest.
6. Check your cash buffer. A common rule of thumb is several months of mortgage interest and an allowance for repairs, but only you know your risk. Decide the number and write it down.
7. Do not raise rent on impulse. If a rise is justified by the market, follow the full process and keep a record of the evidence.
8. Update your records. Keep a dated copy of each offer, rate notice and lender letter. If a lender or a tax adviser asks, you will have the answer.

What to watch next

• The Bank of England's next Bank Rate decision on 17 December 2026, and the November Monetary Policy Report, which sets out the Bank's analysis and projections, including inflation expected to reach about 5% by mid-2027.
• The next Money and Credit release, which will give October's approvals and effective rates. The Bank publishes this monthly.
• The next ONS inflation bulletin, which will show whether the rise in CPI to 3.5% was a one-month jump or the start of a trend.
• Your own fix end dates. They are the one date on this list that is entirely in your control.

Common mistakes

Assuming a fixed rate protects you for ever. It protects you until it ends. The cliff is the risk.

Using the headline rent, not collected rent. Empty months and arrears are real costs. A stress test that ignores them is a flattering one.

Treating the effective rate as your rate. It is an average of everyone's new borrowing. Your broker's quote is the number that matters.

Reading too much into one month. The Bank itself frames approvals against a six-month average. So should you.

Waiting for the headline. By the time a rate change is in the news, lenders have often already repriced. The preparation has to be done before the decision, not after it.

Glossary

Bank Rate: the interest rate set by the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee. It influences the rates lenders charge and savers receive.

MPC (Monetary Policy Committee): the nine-member committee that votes on Bank Rate. In September, six members voted to hold and three voted to raise.

CPI (Consumer Prices Index): the main measure of consumer price inflation, published monthly by the ONS.

Core CPI: CPI excluding food, energy, alcohol and tobacco.

Net mortgage approvals: mortgages approved for house purchase, after cancellations. The Bank calls it an indicator of future borrowing.

Effective interest rate: the actual interest paid on newly drawn mortgages, averaged across borrowers.

Tracker: a mortgage whose rate follows Bank Rate at a set margin.

SVR (standard variable rate): the lender's default rate, which the lender sets and can change.

Interest-only: a loan where you pay the interest each month and repay the capital at the end.

Stress test: a check of whether a property still covers its costs if rates rise, rent falls or the property is empty for longer.

The bottom line

The official numbers are not a forecast, but they point one way: borrowing costs are higher than a year ago, fewer purchases are being approved, and inflation has moved up. With the Bank of England having raised Bank Rate to 4% on 5 November, the useful work for a landlord is the same as before. Know which loans you have and when they end. Know how much a one-point rise would cost. Know whether each property would still cover itself on a bad year. That is an hour's work, it costs nothing, and it is far better done before a lender's letter arrives than after.

If you want a quick way to run the numbers, use the free Deal Analyser. It is for everyone, it needs no sign-up, and nothing you enter is stored.

Sources: Bank of England, Money and Credit (September 2026 and September 2025); Bank of England, Monetary policy; ONS, Consumer price inflation, UK: September 2026; HMRC on GOV.UK; House of Commons Library; Reuters and the BBC (as press reports of expectations only). Bank of England, Bank Rate decision and Monetary Policy Summary and Minutes (November 2026). Checked on 5 November 2026: the decision section was updated that day after the announcement; other figures are as checked on 4 November 2026. England only. This is general information, not financial, tax or legal advice. Speak to an FCA-regulated mortgage adviser and your accountant about your own position.