{"id":798743,"date":"2026-10-11T03:20:32","date_gmt":"2026-10-11T03:20:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/798743\/"},"modified":"2026-10-11T03:20:32","modified_gmt":"2026-10-11T03:20:32","slug":"pepper-rate-hike-to-heap-more-misery-on-distressed-borrowers-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/798743\/","title":{"rendered":"Pepper rate hike to heap more misery on distressed borrowers \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The news that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/pepper-finance\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/pepper-finance\/\">Pepper Advantage<\/a> is increasing its standard variable interest rates by up to half a percentage point next month will come as a bitter blow to around 13,000 borrowers who have their loans managed by the company.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In a news release confirming the hike, Pepper did not say what the new rates would be because, as a spokeswoman subsequently explained to this newspaper, \u201cthese loans sit across multiple portfolios that originated with different lenders and at different points in time. As a result, there is no single Pepper variable rate\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">What we do know is they will be substantially higher than those available from more traditional lenders. A person with a Pepper-managed loan is likely to be paying at least two percentage points above what is on offer elsewhere. And that makes a huge difference to affordability. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Someone moving from a Pepper variable rate to a fixed rate with one of the more traditional lenders could see their rate fall by 2\u00bd percentage points or more. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Many Pepper customers \u2013 those who saw their loans moved from other banks after they got into financial difficulties during the crash and subsequent years \u2013 have been unable to refinance elsewhere because of poor repayment records.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-it-article-body__interstitial-link\">[\u00a0<a aria-label=\"Open related story\" class=\"c-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/your-money\/2026\/10\/09\/irelands-new-personal-investment-accounts-what-you-need-to-know\/\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ireland\u2019s new personal investment accounts: What you need to knowOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Being unable to switch and avail of cheaper rates available elsewhere will see someone with a \u20ac200,000 outstanding loan at Pepper worse off by around \u20ac300 every single month.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">That is, by any measure, grossly unfair. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Pepper says it \u201cderives no commercial benefit from changes in interest rates on the portfolios it services on behalf of beneficial owners\u201d. And we have no reason to doubt that but someone, somewhere, is making money out of the misery of a significant number of Irish people, many of whom are still paying a heavy price for the property crash almost 20 years on. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The news that Pepper Advantage is increasing its standard variable interest rates by up to half a percentage&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":798744,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[84,43932,1294,814,25949,262659,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-798743","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-cantillon","tag-economy","tag-interest-rates","tag-mortgages","tag-pepper-finance","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798743","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=798743"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798743\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/798744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=798743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=798743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=798743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}