It's time to move your mortgage!

With rates at new lows, it may be worth paying a penalty to swap your home loan.

According to the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML), there are 11.3 million mortgages in the UK.

Together, these home loans add up to a debt exceeding £1.2 trillion, which is nearly a year's total output (UK gross domestic product is over £1.3 trillion).

Mortgage rates tumble

In other words, we Brits have borrowed a ton of money to buy our homes.

Then again, the total value of UK domestic property is perhaps £3.6 trillion. Thus, as a nation, we have twice as much housing equity (the difference between a property's value and the loans secured on it) as what we owe in home loans.

More good news: mortgage rates have plunged in recent years. In July 2008, the average yearly mortgage rate for existing loans was 5.79%, according to the Bank of England. Three years later, in July 2011, this average rate had dropped to an all-time low of just 3.42%.

Therefore, thanks to much lower monthly repayments, most mortgage borrowers should be jumping with joy.

The missing millions

Alas, millions of homeowners have completely missed out on these ultra-low rates, purely because they haven't bothered to shop around for cheaper mortgages.

Of course, you don't need to move home to change your mortgage.

The easiest way to switch loans is to demand a better deal from your existing lender. In many cases, you'll be able to switch to a cheaper rate at little expense. This could save you a fortune -- for example, trimming 1% off the rate for a £150,000 interest-only mortgage will save you £1,500 a year. This would knock £125 off your monthly repayments.

If your existing lender won't play ball, then have an independent, no-fee mortgage service search the entire market for you. With over 2,500 mortgages to choose from, this isn't easy to do yourself.

The costs of remortgaging

There are several things you need to bear in mind when considering whether to remortgage. Clearly, it's not worth doing if the cost of switching outweighs the savings to be made over the life of the new deal.

Then again, with mortgage rates at record lows, the potential savings could be massive. Indeed, it may be worth paying a hefty exit fee in order to ditch your existing home loan in favour of a cheaper alternative.

When you do your homework, it's important to know exactly what you'll be charged when you dump your current mortgage. In particular, you should watch out for these 10 hidden costs lurking in your mortgage. The biggest of these are likely to be exit fees charged by your current lender, plus arrangement fees charged by your new lender.

Cherry-picking the best borrowers

Since the credit crunch struck four years ago, it's become increasingly difficult to borrow, because banks have tightened up their lending standards.

Nevertheless, if you own a quarter (25%) or more of your home, you can access some of the lowest rates I've seen in 25 years in financial services. For example, with a 40% deposit, you could fix for five years at 3.34%.

Here are six table-topping mortgages to whet your appetite:

Best buy variable rates

With ING Direct, you can grab a discount of 1.9% from its standard variable rate for two years, bringing the current rate down to 1.9% a year. However, ING's fee is a hefty £1,945, so this deal is best for larger loans.

Yorkshire BS has a three-year deal which works out at 2.29% a year for now, with a fee of £995. This loan is available to borrowers with a deposit or equity of 25% or more.

Lastly, mega-bank HSBC has a lifetime tracker with no fee charging 1.99% above the Bank of England base rate, for a current rate of 2.49% a year. However, you'll need a big deposit (40% or more) to qualify for this home loan.

Best buy fixed rates

Borrowers with a 40% deposit can get a two-year fix at 2.35% a year from Spanish-owned Santander. However, this comes with a hefty fee of £1,995, so is best for larger loans.

Yorkshire BS offers a three-year fix at 2.69% a year to borrowers with at least a 25% deposit. Again, the fee is a chunky £1,945.

Over five years, Chelsea BS (now owned by Yorkshire BS) offers a fix at 3.29% a year. The fee is £1,495 and you'll need at least a 30% deposit.

Frankly, having had a 10-year fix at 6.25% a year in the Nineties and Noughties, I'd leap on any of the six deals shown above!

What are you waiting for?

I know that many lovemoney.com readers go to great lengths to shop around for the cheapest deals for gadgets such as a new flat-screen television, iPad or mobile phone.

However, with mortgage interest likely to be your biggest household bill, you should always put your home loan at the top of your shop-around list.

In short, what are you waiting for? Try our completely free, totally unbiased mortgage service today. You have nothing to lose but higher repayments...

More: Find your perfect mortgage | The best new mortgage deals | Avoid interest for 22 months

At lovemoney.com, you can research all the best deals yourself using our online mortgage service, or speak directly to a whole-of-market, fee-free lovemoney.com broker. Call 0800 804 8045 or email mortgages@lovemoney.com for more help.

This article aims to give information, not advice. Always do your own research and/or seek out advice from an FSA-regulated broker (such as one of our brokers here at lovemoney.com), before acting on anything contained in this article. 

Finally, we tend to only give the initial rate of a deal in our articles, but any deal which lasts for a shorter period than your mortgage term may revert to the lender's standard variable rate or a tracker rate when the deal ends. Before you take out a deal, you should always try to find out from your lender what its standard variable rate is and how it will be determined in the future. Make sure you take all this information into account when comparing different deals.

Your home or property may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage.