London & Country – A word of warning

QuidProQuo

I have used London & Country to search mortgages over ‘the whole of market’ twice in the last 5 weeks.

On both occasions I have NOT been offered the best deal on the market.

The remortgage guide needs updating to add Direct Line to the list of companies that London & Country do not search (HSBC, Egg and Yorkshire Building Society).

HelpWhereIcan

QuidProQuo wrote:

I have used London & Country to search mortgages over ‘the whole of market’ twice in the last 5 weeks.

On both occasions I have NOT been offered the best deal on the market.

The remortgage guide needs updating to add Direct Line to the list of companies that London & Country do not search (HSBC, Egg and Yorkshire Building Society).

Far be it for me to defend L&C, but I would be interested to know on what basis you decided that the deal offered by Direct Line was 'better' than the one L&C offered you. Please spill the gory details

QuidProQuo

I'll get back to you later with some more details it may take some time and I'm not very quick at typing :cool:

stanmoresaver

HelpWhereIcan wrote:

Far be it for me to defend L&C, but I would be interested to know on what basis you decided that the deal offered by Direct Line was 'better' than the one L&C offered you. Please spill the gory details

Thats a very fair point HWIC.

I have been fairly damning of both the L&C model and practices but it would be good if we could have the detail on which you base your accusations as the OP does rather smack of being "guilty before proven innocent".

SS

QuidProQuo

stanmoresaver wrote:

Thats a very fair point HWIC.

I have been fairly damning of both the L&C model and practices but it would be good if we could have the detail on which you base your accusations as the OP does rather smack of being "guilty before proven innocent".

SS

In that case I look forward to you proving me wrong

payless

Think you find in their initial spiel they give it ( or used to) says something like " dealing with products that we can assist in processing"- coulkd be wrong but seems to cover ( although IMHO if this is the case its conflicts their marketing material)

MortgageMamma

I dont think SS is out to prove you wrong Quid, but the actual definition of a whole of market broker is that you only have to offer products that you have access to. Direct Line does not allow applications through intermediaries, and L & C wouldnt get paid for it if they recommended Direct Line for you.

So either L & C charge you a fee and tell you who this lender is and you go off and sort your own mortgage, or they dont charge fee's a recommend a lender that will pay them if you submit an application. Its all quite normal.

lowis

ah...if L&C don't have access to HSBC that would explain why i found a better mortgage than the one they offered me.

personally i was after a 3yr fix for aRTB flat on the 11 th floor - the best L&C offered me was 2 yr with Abbey. I found two mortgages better than the Abbey one offered - HSBC and Nationwide.

It's all clear now - so they aren't really whole of market then?

MortgageMamma

They could be whole of market if you asked to pay them a fee and refund any commisison, you could specifically ask them to look at lenders outwith their normal remits and offer to pay for it, but, L & C are not all they are cracked up to be, I would personally recommend you use a local whole of market broker and explain your requirements.

HTH

MM

payless

AS a "WoM " they don't have to mention lenders that they don't have access to, HOWEVER until recently seem to remember they did have comments on their website along the lines of " all the lenders" and "are you sure your adviser would recommend a product - even if it did not pay a fee ... We do" ( do the posts above back that up?)

I can't see that in their guides anymore ... although they do say "there is no need to ever pay a fee." ..... Well actually a independent might be able to consider all lenders ( including non commission / direct) .. especially if employed on a fee basis ( independents have to offer at least the option to work on fee based ) ... although then rebating the commission if he gets paid ( you could actually end up with money back in some cases, although that dpends on the fee and commission levels )..

. if its a no commission lender, that comes up best- you can then decide whether to take that deal ( and pay the adviser for his time anyway - although it might be only part if you you don't complete ) or consider if the Commission rebated offsets the fee and actually makes a "commision"product better ......( agin the adviser will usually do the sums)

ITS CALLED INDEPENDENT FEE BASED ADVICE.. unfortunately this is where I disagree with Martin's article, as he assumes that fees will be higher than the commission rebated.

dunstonh

It's all clear now - so they aren't really whole of market then?

Whole of market doesnt mean they are going to check every mortgage possible. If Direct Line do not provide their data to the independent research tools database then you cannot expect them to be included in the research.