Top marks for council roading programme

Kāpiti Coast District Council has been given the top rating for its roading programme in a recent Waka Kotahi audit.

The three-yearly Waka Kotahi

Matters Of Law

Refinancing is the process of restructuring your lending to terms more favourable to your situation and current market conditions. If you change lenders, this might involve discharging your current mortgage and registering one in favour of your new lender (this is why refinancing is sometimes referred to as “remortgaging”). If you stay with your current lender, you will need only to register a variation of mortgage on the title of your property.

Why would I refinance?

There are several reasons you might want to refinance. For instance, if you have a fixedterm loan about to expire, you might want to refinance to find a better interest rate and loan term than your current lender is be able to offer. Otherwise, refinancing can be useful where your income has changed, where you want to take out extra lending for property renovations, or where you want to consolidate your existing debt.

Is now the right time?

If you’re contemplating refinancing, you will want to do some shopping around to see how other banks’ interest rates compare to your current lender. If these rates are better than your current rates, it could be time to make the switch. There are several online tools that can help you to compare interest rates.

However, you will want to reflect on your current financing, too. If you’re on a fixed-term rate, when does the term expire? If the term has not yet expired, there might be various break fees associated with ending the term early. Relatedly, if you received a cash incentive for financing with your current bank, its possible you will need to pay all or some of this incentive back to the bank. We recommend you check your loan documentation to see if this will affect you.

If your current interest rates are about to expire, it can be tempting to contact your current lender, request a fixed-term interest rate, and “re-fix” the documents accordingly. However, there is always the opportunity to negotiate with your existing lender to try to get a better re-fix rate than their current standard rates and/or even a further cash contribution.

Mortgage brokers

If you’re likely to find the above too overwhelming, or if you don’t have the time to do it yourself, it could be useful to engage a mortgage broker.

Mortgage brokers help to take the stress out of the process and do all the comparisons for you. They can also provide advice about your short and long-term mortgage repayment goals and how they can be best achieved.

You might find that not only can you get better fixed-interest rates, but also higher cash contributions. This often means that the cash contribution covers the legal fees for the refinance and leaves plenty left over for some extra spending, as well as potentially saving thousands of dollars in interest.

n Francesca is a general practice solicitor based at the Ōtaki office of Wakefields Lawyers.

Procedural Investment Audit assesses how well government investment in local roading programmes is managed and delivering value for money.

Waka Kotahi typically invests 51 percent of the Kāpiti council’s $10-$14 million annual land transport programme. The audit showed the council’s contract management, financial processes and procurement procedures were sound.

Council access and transport manager Glen O’Connor says the “effective” rating received is the highest available and means Kāpiti is doing a great job of the financial administration and processes associated with funding claimed from Waka Kotahi.

“This is really important work our teams do on behalf of the community and the audit result is testament to a job well done,” Glen says. “Making sure things like our contract management, procurement and financial processes are meeting the required standards helps us access the Waka Kotahi funding we need for our transport network.”