CIFAS Marker - Please help me someone - I am sick with worry

Hotlips_3 · 8 April 2008 at 4:22PM

Dear Moneysavers
Can someone give me the right advice? I applied for a credit card last august and was declined - no reason given. I am due to remortgage this month and I got my credit file and it had a CIFAS marker on it. To cut a VERY long story short, on my credit card application, I put I had lived at my current address for 30 years and 5 months (I have lived there since 1977, but moved out for 5 years and my mother continued to live there and after her death I bought the house). When the credit card company ran a check, it showed up my previous address (obviously), where I was declared bankrupt in 2001 (which is now off my credit file). CIFAS are saying I have deliberately used 'material falsehood' in my application.
I have tried to argue that I would not have intentionally put wrong information on the form, as I know what I went through with the bankruptcy! I was going through a bad time and I think I was panicking and just filled out a number of application forms (the others didn't have any wrong information on). CIFAS are not willing to remove the marker - and I have just had my mortgage application denied - which potentially means I could lose my house.
Please, please, please, can someone give me some advice? I know I made a mistake, but it was a genuine one, and now no-one will help me....
Thanks

jonesMUFCforever · 8 April 2008 at 6:11PM

You bought the house after your mother's death - surely you have a mortgage then?
How can this lead to you losing the house?

dhassen · 8 April 2008 at 6:28PM

yea you mightn't be able to re mortgage but you already have one right? You'll have to see if you can cope with your current provider's higher rates, assuming that you're on some sort of deal at the moment...

Hotlips_3 · 8 April 2008 at 6:41PM

I have a mortgage, yes - and I came out of my fixed rate in Feb, which I need to now remortgage. I had a very high rate for my initial mortgage - so a remortgage is needed in order to keep my head above water.
Thanks for your question

thebaroness · 8 April 2008 at 6:51PM

Are you sure the Cifas is the reason for the mortgage being declined?

Gillianh2 · 8 April 2008 at 7:06PM

Might it be possible to add a note to explain the Cifas marker. Explaining the situation and how this arose. Or might it be worth explaining the situation to any mortgage companies that you are going to make an application to before you actually make the application.

galileo · 8 April 2008 at 8:40PM

One option would be to contact your existing lender and see if they can switch you onto a cheaper product.

Many lenders allow you to switch products after your initial rate has finished. They won't normally do a credit search if all ur doing is switching products and not looking to borrow any more money. Granted they won't switch you to a market leading rate but it will save you many sleepless nights worrying if you will be able to remortgage or not...

jonnyb · 10 April 2008 at 1:21AM

hotlips, if I buy my mum's house tomorrow, and move in, then apply for a card in a month's time, my answer to the question "how long have you lived at your CURRENT address?" would be 1 month.

how hard can it be ? you quite clearly had not lived there for 30 years; you had moved out and then moved back.

they ask these questions for a reason; if you chose to forget about your previous address, where the adverse information just happened to be sitting, then you have got to accept the consequences.

Ironically, if you had disclosed your previous address with the bankruptcy, it was so old that they might have let it slide anyway.

You can add a notice of correction to your file, and a cifas flag cannot be used as the reason for an automatic decline by a lender, but I expect you will be stuck with the cifas flag.

udydudy · 11 April 2008 at 7:50PM

Hotlips wrote: »

I have a mortgage, yes - and I came out of my fixed rate in Feb, which I need to now remortgage. I had a very high rate for my initial mortgage - so a remortgage is needed in order to keep my head above water.
Thanks for your question

I am not sure you can remove the CIFAS record for 6 years, so the best way would be to put a notice of correction on your credit files with all 3 credit agencies.

Second with the way the finance market is I would suggest you plan a way to kep your head above the financial floods(rather financial drought) and hope you can afford your current lenders SVR.

Wait another 6-12 months, prepare for 12 months. once this credit crunch is over your current lender should give you better deals. My expectation is UK is now going through what the US has gone through over the last 6-9 months. So our CRUNCH has just begun.

Time to batten down the hatches and wait for time to calm the money markets. Once the banks start lending to each other by Jan 2009(my expectation) the mortgage rates will come down. Until then even if the BoE takes rates down by 2% from here the mortgage rates will stay high!!!!

The problem is liquidity not interest rates!!

bethanyrayne · 12 April 2008 at 3:21PM

udydudy wrote: »

Time to batten down the hatches and wait for time to calm the money markets. Once the banks start lending to each other by Jan 2009(my expectation) the mortgage rates will come down. Until then even if the BoE takes rates down by 2% from here the mortgage rates will stay high!!!!

The problem is liquidity not interest rates!!

I think you're being way over optimistic. I predict more bad news to come, maybe worse than you've already had!

CIFAS Marker - Please help me someone - I am sick with worry

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