There are certainly some advantages to going for a fixed rate mortgage.

• If it's important to you to be able to budget, it's very helpful to know exactly what your mortgage payment is going to be throughout the period of the mortgage. With a variable rate, budgeting is obviously much more difficult, since your mortgage payment is probably by far the biggest of your monthly outgoings.

• With a variable rate mortgage, an unexpected major interest-rate rise can be very worrying. Having a fixed rate mortgage gives you the security of knowing that even if the bank base rate rises, your payments will stay the same.

• If your fixed rate mortgage is for a fairly short term, you can fix it at quite a low rate. This can be very beneficial especially for first-time buyers.

But of course, fixed rate mortgages also have a number of drawbacks.

• If mortgage rates fall during the period of your mortgage deal, it could well prove to have been more expensive in the long run than a standard variable rate mortgage.

• Fixed rate mortgages often come with a redemption penalty. This means that, if you wanted to switch to another fixed rate mortgage from another lender at the end of your term, instead of reverting to your own lender's standard variable rate mortgage, you would have to pay.

• If interest rates have gone up during the period of your fixed rate mortgage, and you then revert to your lender's standard variable rate mortgage, the difference could come as a nasty shock. You could well struggle to budget, both because of the higher payments, and because you are not used to the uncertainty of not knowing whether the payments will stay the same.

• Sometimes going for a longer-term fixed rate mortgage can seem very tempting, especially if interest rates seem to be on the rise. However, you may well find you are locked into it, which can cause problems if your circumstances change. Plus of course, if interest rates fall, you would end up paying well over the odds.

So what do you do if you seriously want to find out whether a fixed rate mortgage would be right for you or not? There are some steps you can take to help you make the decision

• Talk to a mortgage broker or mortgage adviser, to help you weigh up the pros and cons, and to help you find the product that would be right for you.

• If you are interested in a specific product, look carefully at all the costs including arrangement fees and redemption charges, to make sure you get the most advantageous deal.

• Remember that taking out a fixed rate mortgage is always a gamble to a certain extent. Nobody can predict interest rates over a period of time.

A fixed rate mortgage can be a very good idea for some people. But don't think of it as a magic bullet. Take advice and look at the pros and cons, to see whether it's right for you.