If history has demonstrated anything, it’s that there really IS a sucker born every minute. Unfortunately, when it comes to mortgage deals, there are as many suckers as there are banking institutions that have money to lend them. These days, getting your bank to lend you money for lunch is problem an impossible dream, but back in the days of low interest rates and frivolous spending, you couldn’t find anything wilder than the 5 Craziest mortgage deals outlined below!

1) First on our list of 5 craziest mortgage deals: The “Together” mortgage
The infamous Northern Bank once allowed homeowners to borrow up to an-unheard-of 125% of the value of their home! These loans were split between a secured mortgage worth 95 per cent of the property’s value and an unsecured personal loan for the final 30 per cent. During housing’s golden years – roughly 2004 to 2007 – thousands of homeowners sunk their teeth into these loans. Only find themselves today with mortgages that greatly exceed the value of their homes. And wouldn’t you know it – Northern Bank and many other financial institutions like them will no longer lend to these individuals.

2) Eight to ten times your salary
Go back a mere 10 to 15 years and it wasn’t that much of a stretch to convince a lender to loan you 8 or 10 times your annual salary. Not bad – especially if you earned a decent salary! In the UK, Morgan Stanley lead the pack – offering qualified applicants 8-times-salary deals, while on the other side of the Atlantic in the US, GE Home Lending (owned by General Electric) offered a whopping 10 times salary through its First National brand. Problem was, after you calculated the accrued interest, applicants needed a lot longer than 8 or 10 years to pay all that money back. Ouch!

3) Third on our list of 5 craziest mortgage deals ever…Foreign Currency Mortgages
A sure thing? Take your home currency and convery it when buing a house! The problem with foreign currency loans is that as your home currency declines relative to the foreign currency, the cost of making your loan payments rises considerably.

4) Libor mortgages
Borrowers with less than perfect credit histories, — and there are 1000’s of them – are known as sub-prime borrowers. And they have typically faced high interest rates that could put a choke hold on even the most well-meaning home-owner. During the last couple of years many lending institutions who cater to sub-prime borrowers have tied a borrower’s fixed rate deals onto a variable rate which in turn is tied to a three-month LIBER – which last time anyone checked was still over 1.3 percentage points higher than the base lending rate.

5) Fifth on our list of 5 craziest mortgage deals…The Rover 200 Mortgage!
Is this a great deal or what? Secure a mortgage with the West Bromwich Building Society and get a free automobile (the Rover 200) in the process! Small problem though – West Brom’s rates were terrible and the Rover 200 was plagued from the moment it left the plant! If there’s a moral here it’s that nothing is ever really free (and if it is free it’ll probably break)!

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