BBC 1 'Repossesed - Upsetting To Say The Least!

MABLE

My sympathy was with the couple who bought their house from the council for £40k. The husband was a hard working decent person but they were just not ready for home ownership. I cant help feeling council house tenants should stay as such because the majority are just not prepared to own their own property and all the responsibility that brings.

Kaz2904

I watched this all the way through but missed a couple of minutes where we saw the 1st couple going from 4.1% and where we saw the 2nd couple say that he was a mortgage broker.

I was filled with respect for the bailiffs I have to say because the first one knocked on the door and asked for a word in private and when not allowed in he whispered that he was from the (I think it was county court?) and used the initials which would hopefully have been missed by nosey neighbours.

The 1st couple (car man) I really felt for. He said himself low skilled, she didn't appear to work. Again- they had sold their house but were unable to port- they obviously didn't realise what could have been coming. He did say he would never have another mortgage he would only buy a reduced prce council house for cash. £800 per month would struggle to provide that. I don't think they had a hugely lavish lifestyle.

The 2nd couple. She went out to work to cover the food bill. They had 7 children. When asked they had 7 children it was the programme makers who pointed out that 2 were nieces (clearly hers by the hair and looks!). Now this couple seem to have learnt their lesson and learned it the hard way. SHe said at the end, look forward to having a normal life- I think she used the words within their means but I certainly got the impression that she meant no frilly bits. I felt for them but don't know if I would have felt so awful if I had known he was a mortgage broker before I saw the rest of the programme.

Couple 3. The kids had gap clothing, PS2 (or 3?) games and lots of stuff. The house was dripping with tellies etc. He is a builder. No labour costs if you can wait.

Personally, I spent the whole of last year waiting for my lounge to be done. DH started stripping the walls on 6th January. I came home from work and said 12th night just means Christmas decs love! The whole lot had to be done including new fireplace and plaster and ceiling. Due to work commitments it took nearly all year. He then managed to do our dining room which is linked in 6 weeks.
This cost a lot of money. We needed carpet throughout- cost £700 as we wanted a long guarantee. We hadn't planned on the ceiling falling down, an extra £200 ish and we didn't have a dining room table so we bought a solid wood table that will hopefully last until we need coffins.
The difference is that we saved for this.

My DH is terrible at searching around for prices but our tv died 18 months ago. He had already been on about a new one so I had researched the best deal. When it went bang I told him what was the best and told him he had to wait til I had found the cheapest deal that day as he wouldn't put up with a little one for longer than 1 evening.
He duly toddled off to currys that night to haggle with them about their online price. They didn't have it available so showed him another. He got the sympathy vote and got £200 off because he said my wife will send me back with it if I don't get any money off, what can you do? (It's true, I would have done!)

People are going to get burnt, badly during this time of recession. I really hope that we survive it and I hope people learn the hard lessons that need to be learned.

Obi167

Norman, Norman, Norman.... I cant say I don't feel sorry for his family, but he seemed like one of the most aggressive, nasty, uneducated people around and was probably talked into a mortgage by one of the unscrupulous, back street (we can get you 15x your wage) brokers and was too stupid to see it was a bad idea - then again he can always go back and hit him!

feisty1

When yr trying to put the blame on to advisers, can u pls remember that lenders take the ultimate decision, the application is submitted to the lender and has to go thru their process before funds are released, the adviser doesn't have the authority to do this!

Obi167

feisty1 wrote: »

When yr trying to put the blame on to advisers, can u pls remember that lenders take the ultimate decision, the application is submitted to the lender and has to go thru their process before funds are released, the adviser doesn't have the authority to do this!

I understand that, but when I was looking for a mortgage (which i now have a nice affordable one), I went to many brokers - some of which wanted to offer me masses more money by fiddling the amounts I got through overtime / bonus's etc. I know that the broker in question is still in business and probably lining people up for a fall as we've seen in the BBC program.

I'm not saying in anyway that brokers are bad (in fact the one I used was great - he gave me any commission he earn't from the lender over the £250 he was taking). All i'm saying is there are many out there that aren't so great and are only worried about the commission check they get at the end - which ultimately decides what mortgage they (try to) sell you.

mothershipton

just watched this on iplayer.
I didnt realise that Norman had a whopping £180K mortgage, how the hell did he get that on the £800 a month he told the CAB advisor. and the mortgage advisor .....
The couple that got to keep their house, I just didnt get their story at all. having borrowed £150K they said they had only got an extra £17k for the house ?? anyone understand?? And i thought the baliffs were very professional and courteous and dont agree with the OP.

As other people mentioned I was looking at all the gadgets and stuff in their house. I would be selling everything i owned in an effort to keep the house

i thought it was quite sweet of one lot of the kids to sort out stuff the carboot but didnt agree with the dad not going with it all, i think it would have been a valuable lesson for the kids

My brother in law has got himself into a similar situation but luckily is still paying the mortgage, however this is way more than the house is worth. he is just so naive with money and still spends to show off...

i think kids should be taught financial awareness at school or by parents (if they have any themselves) as the financial decisions we have to make are so complicated and you cant trust the banks can you.

ill stop ranting now. a very interesting program and Im so glad i will never be repossessed

RobertoMoir

feisty1 wrote: »

When yr trying to put the blame on to advisers, can u pls remember that lenders take the ultimate decision, the application is submitted to the lender and has to go thru their process before funds are released, the adviser doesn't have the authority to do this!

This comes back to what I've said before about irresponsible lenders needing irresponsible borrowers. It's pretty clear in some of these cases that someone could have introduced some sanity into the process while things were still ok, but either no one tried or they got ignored.

Bad advice can trip a lot of these people up, who seem to place a rather touching faith in what certain places say to them regardless of the logic of what is said. When I worked as a bailiff, I saw some shocking advice given to debtors by places like CAB that essentially left me no choice but to enforce the debt hard (e.g. either get the amount paid in full cleared funds there and then or remove goods).

I've actually had situations where I've managed to negotiate a deal and had it undone because the debtor rang the CAB "to get a second opinion" and they undid a lot of hard work and left the debtor in a far worse place.

And you won't see these places standing next to the debtor when they follow CAB advice and end up getting arrested for non payment of council tax, or better still, for assaulting a bailiff because CAB said the bailiff was trespassing and could be thrown out of a property with as much physical force as they liked. Both of those are true stories, neither of them ended well for the debtor concerned, and CAB advisers didn't want to know when their advice dropped the poor person in it.

Of course this was a long time ago now. Maybe things have changed there, I sure hope so.

hoggums

I actually feel most sorry for the partner of the so called mortgage broker. That loser kept flogging a dead horse - lying to her every month saying things will be alright.

I'm sure before they met she was doing fine with her own house. Now her life is ruined by this numpty she's shacked up with - a bankrupt who clearly has no career now and given the fact he'd had a bad credit record BEFORE getting this ridiculous £1700pm mortgage cannot manage money.

They say love is blind - well it must be blind, deaf and dumb. He's ruined her life.

lisyloo

They say love is blind - well it must be blind, deaf and dumb. He's ruined her life.

Whereas she was was a real catch, earning £200 per week and spending a fortune on makeup, manicures and having her neices as well as children in tow.

What made you think he was lying? Was there any evidence of that. I didn't pick up on that.
I thought it was just a non punctual payment.
I wouldn't be suprised if he was optimistic about it's arrival, but I think accusing him of lying without evidence is overly harsh.

RainMaker_2

maggie5 wrote: »

as much as i dont agree with the way that SOME of the baliffs work i understand that they have to do a job, thats what they are employed to do. you wouldnt work in a shop and then refuse to take peoples money for their shopping.

you also have t remember that the baliffs have proberly heard all the excuses before and therefore dont know who is telling the truth and who is lying.

i also thought that baliffs were the last step in recovering debt, so surely the people had the chance to talk or come to a agreement with the original lenders or maybe im wrong

please remember that these are just peoples jobs, it doesnt nessacerly mean that they are bad people

Agree it doesn't necessarily make them bad people. But you have to be a certain "type" of person to do that job for a living. Certainly not the "type" of person I'd ever want to have as a friend, however desperate.