Investing

Select Property Group has launched a new student property investment. Vita Student at Westgate, Newcastle, is a 259-bed residence. Investors who buy one of the studio apartments at Westgate are offered a contractually assured seven per cent rental yield for five years which will start to be paid once the residence is opened. Prices range from £86k to £159k.

Schroders is launching a global multi-asset fund. The Schroder Global Multi-Asset Income fund, launching on 19 December, will be managed by the multi-asset team and aim to deliver regular income payments. It will target an unguaranteed distribution payment of four to six per cent per annum in monthly instalments and will have a target total return of seven per cent.

Leeds Building Society has launched a new five year fixed-rate cash ISA. The ISA pays 2.25 per cent interest tax-free as is available from today.

AXA Wealth has announced it will remove the regular charges on both its Pension Investment Account and drawdown services available via the Elevate platform. The charges will be removed for all new and existing customers from January 2015 as part of AXA Wealth’s response to the changing pensions landscape.

IG Group has launched a collateral service allowing clients to use existing shareholdings on their stockbroking platforms as margin to open new contracts for difference (‘CFDs’) or financial spread bets. Clients will be able to use up to 95 per cent of the value of their shares to cover the margin required to fund leveraged trades.

Mortgages

The West Brom building society has announced it is increasing its maximum loan size from £500,000 to £1m for loans up to 75 per cent loan-to-value (LTV).

Barclays has launched a range of remortgage products as well as announced cuts to its fixed rate deals to entice customers in the run up to Christmas. The remortgage deals include a two-year tracker at plus 0.79 per cent at 60 per cent LTV. A two-year fixed rate of 1.79 per cent at 70 per cent LTV and a five-year fix of 2.79 per cent at 70 per cent LTV are also available. The two rate cuts which are part of the bank’s great escape range are a two-year fixed rate at 2.25 per cent at 70 per cent LTV and a five-year fixed rate at 2.99 per cent at 70 per cent LTV.

Santander has launched its lowest ever two year fixed-rate remortgage. It offers a 1.84 per cent rate up to 60 per cent LTV.

Offers

American Express‘ latest Shop Small promotion, running from the 6 December to 21 December offers Cardmembers a £5 credit statement when they spend £10 in any participating local independent business. Cardmembers can use the offer once at each participating business and there’s no cap to the number of times they can use the offer. To register your card log on to www.amexshopsmall.co.uk/register.