Northern Rock Rip off on further advances

Leon_W

picardygirl

As far as I am aware, if you are in NRAM then you cannot raise additional funds because they do not have a banking license.

If you wish to raise additional funds (over £3k) then NRAM will "consider" a refund of the ERCs if you remortgage to another lender.

Now, NRAM are being a bit cagey about this but it appears to be the case as other brokers I know have achieved this result for their clients.

Hope this helps.

picardygirl

Leon_W wrote: »

picardygirl

As far as I am aware, if you are in NRAM then you cannot raise additional funds because they do not have a banking license.

If you wish to raise additional funds (over £3k) then NRAM will "consider" a refund of the ERCs if you remortgage to another lender.

Now, NRAM are being a bit cagey about this but it appears to be the case as other brokers I know have achieved this result for their clients.

Hope this helps.

Leon W - I understood that NRAM were only "considering" refunding the ERC's if you moved lenders and moved house as well as long as the new mortgage was for more than £3k - not for remortgaging? Have i understood it wrong?

loopy_lou_6

Hi Picardy girl, sorry hvnt replied sooner.
Quote" we do not offer any new loans or additional borrowing however we recognise that some customers may wish to take out addotional borrowing and must move to another lender to do this.. Our current policy is that in certain circumstances we will provide a refund of some or all of the ERC and/or help with costs. to apply for this refund you must either:
move home and take out any new mortgage product with Northern Rock PLC within 3 months of redeeming your mortgage with Northern Rock Assett managemagement(this may make you elegible for a refund of upto 50% of the ERC
or
Take out a new mortgage product with any other lender(including Northern Rock PLC)which is at least £3,000 above the total amount that was required to redeem your mortgage with NR Asset management. (this may make you eligible for a refund of up to 100 % of the ERC plus the help with costs if applicable)
If you redeem your mortgage you will be charged the ERC and sent an application form to apply for a refund. This is for a limited time only."
I was told I needed to complete before the 30th of June and send them the paperwork before sept, but that they were reviewing having to extend this offer.
I have rang the phone number "solicitor" on my letter 0191 279 4444 and explained what we are doing and would we qualify, they were even then totally cagey, wouldn't commit, I eventually Phrased it as " if we stay in this house, but remortgage to first direct for £3,000 more than what we owe you, and complete before June 30th and send you the paperwork proof by September then there is no reason why you will not refund our ERC's? Is that the case? She finally relented and said yes. I cant imagine them going back on this but if they do!#*$#"***~. Ring them and find out what your particular options are.:)

loopy_lou_6

Hi again. On the back of my previous post I have just rang Northern Rock again to triple check that i haven't misunderstood this. I have explained to the guy i spoke to, we are NOT moving house, we are in the process of remortgaging to first direct for £3,000 more than we owe you, we will complete before the 30th of june and send you the paperwork straight away, will you refund our charges, and he said yes you fulfill the criteria. We are happy with northern rock, happy with our deal, the rate, the flexible features, which allow us to overpay, which is what we have done for the last 5 years, and would happliy stay with them for the next 5 yrs of our fixed rate deal. But we cannot get further funding, which we need in the next year because we are planning to move and will need a bigger mortgage, whic they cannot give us, it is therefore not portable in the sense that was originally stated in our t & c's. They are not doing this as a goodwill gesture (lol) they are doing this because they can no longer provide people with what they originally offered. Quote from my original general conditions of motgage offer. This mortgage product is portable to another property. If you increase the amount of the loan when transferring it, a one off additional charge of £250 will be charged to the mortgage account......any additional funds can only be borrowed on exactly the same terms as this product if you wish to avoid any ERC when the transfer takes place.. THEY can no longer offer me additional funds on the same terms so THEY are waiving their right to an ERC.
I hope this helps, I will post on my progress, mortgage with First direct should be through in 1-2 weeks. Oh and when I spoke to the guy it really does sound like they are going to be extending this beyond the 30th June. They have been massively cagey about this, and again I'm going to say I found this out by accident, it was a complete fluke. I wish someone would do an article on this in the main e-mail, a definitive guide or something, lots of people seem confused, even though they are savvy and clued up. Northern Rock are not being upfront about this. They were upfront about sending out the letters saying no more funds could be made available, but the info about the ERC's should have been made available at the same time.

loopy_lou_6

BTW, we are getting 100% of the ERC, as we fall into the 2nd category.

loopy_lou_6

picardygirl wrote: »

Leon W - I understood that NRAM were only "considering" refunding the ERC's if you moved lenders and moved house as well as long as the new mortgage was for more than £3k - not for remortgaging? Have i understood it wrong?

I dont think you've understood it wrong, you've been given ambiguous information when you've made enquiries. I've read your posts and I believe you're in the same position as us, ypu just want to find a legitimate way of remortgaging. I hope you make some progress.:)

picardygirl

Loopy Lou - thanks very much for all that .... it is all very interesting. NRAM have changed their minds since I spoke to them in January, the lady i spoke to was very clear to say that you had to move properties to "qualify" for the ERC refund, and had to be at least £3k more than the current mortgage.

Yes, we are tied in til Sept 2011, we have no requirements for additional borrowing or nor do we need to port mortgage, as we dont intend moving for years and years - so i think even if NRAM are agreeing to pay all of the costs we would have to borrow £3k more from another lending, so dont think we would save any money (if we found a better deal), but saying that i've not even worked out what it would cost etc etc.

But, I want to keep up to speed in what NRAM are actually doing, thats why i found your posts very interesting - you never know what is round the corner so its good to know all options available.

Please let me know how you get on with them.

Leon_W

It's still worth considering picardygirl.

If you can find a better deal then borrow the extra £3k and then just pay it back to the new lender. Most of them allow 10% of outstanding capital to be repaid without penalty. Just to reiterrate what loopy lou is saying, you DO NOT have to move house to take up this offer.

Regards

picardygirl

Might be worth looking into a bit further then ....... thanks for the info guys.

loopy_lou_6

If we didn't want to move this year then we would happliy stay, we haven't had any probl ems, and it IS a hassle remortgaging. We are long term, fixed deal, dont have to think about it for years kind of people! But you are only tied in till 2011 as well, our deal was till 2014! Long time to be tied in to a now non portable deal. (in that we CAN port it, we just cant borrow any more should we need to)