First Direct mortgage rates cut and cheaper fees

trophs

I was just wondering what the normal process was in this Mortgage application. I phoned for a mortgage and got the 45mins interview straight away. At the end of the call she put me on hold and then said the indication was I would get it, but this is not an offer in principle. Shae also said I would have to open an account as part of the application and it was £10 per month unless I had one of their products. On checking my experian report she did a credit check for opening a bank account and not for the mortgage.
Is this normal?
Also if my application fails am I stuck with a bank account that cost me £10 a month unless I deposit £1500 per month?
Does anyone know if a Experian credit score of 810 is ok. 1 missed credit card payment in last year and three credit checks for mortages in the last 2 months?

jamesd

It's normal. When you get the paper forms to complete you'll be offered the option to open a savings account. Do that, I think the savings account eliminates the fee. If you don't get the mortgage or decide you don't want the mortgage you can close the current account if you want to.

If they were going to reject you for the missed payment they would probably have done that already. Not guaranteed, their underwriters won't yet have taken a proper look at your application and they might find some other reason to decline.

The mortgage credit checks should be OK.

uzubairu

AdamBrunt wrote: »

Cool, sounds like a formal letter should be in the post for me soon then.

You don't have to pay anthing to whom ? FD (not even the £99 or the £99 valuation fee) or the solicitors ? Also, what are the solicitors doing with regards to the remortgage ?

We pay £198 for the fee and valuation.

We received a letter from enact (direct legal solutions) who have been instructed by First Direct to deal with the legal aspects of the re-mortgage.

Taken from our letter:
3 Costs
As you are aware first direct will pay our standard fees for dealing with your remortgage.

4 Additional services
first direct have agreed to pay the fees for the basic conveyancing service and we do not anticipate there will be any additional costs to you. If however, when we check the title to your property, we discover that additional work is required we will let you know before we progress.

Jackinbox99

Well, ive just had probably one of my worse banking experiences to date and thats been with First Direct.

I phone up 3 weeks back, go through the whole mortgage process with them over the phone for 45minutes discussing what I want, outgoings, incomings, savings. Guy goes off to his manager, comes back and says its all fine.

I find a suitable house, ring up FD again and double check the mortgage situation. Again, the person goes off, speaks to their manager and after 50mins on the phone to them (0845 cost me 20quid from my mobile as i didnt have access to a landline) discusing all my incomes, outgoings, situation etc, they all confirm once again mortgage situation is fine.

Based upon what they will lend me, i put offer in on a house. Offer gets accepted. Solicitors appointed. As part of the process im transfering my current account to FD also. That process starts. I then find out that they have setup 2 current accounts for me instead of one. I get them to cancel one. They cancel the wrong one. Not a good start.

Mortgage app arrives, I fill in, send back the same day. Stressing a condition of this house purchase is that it needs to complete within 28days. FD say no problem.

3 days later, I get a txt message saying they are processing my application - all good so far and im impressed with how quick they are acting.

Then, that same evening 3 days after they get the app, I get a call from their mortgage processing person saying they will now not give me a mortgage as I already have a house which I am not selling immediately. There will be an overlap of about 4->6 months before my current property sells, simply because the new house needs work doing to it so it will give me change to do this before moving in. This was all clearly explained on the phone to them previously.

Im in a very good financial situation - The total of both mortgages on my current house & the new one would come in at less than 1/4 of my monthly income AFTER TAX. I have a 25% deposit for new house, good credit and am not stretching myself in the slightest. Even if my current house took 12months to sell, it would only be costing me £200 a month on a repayment mortgage and would not have any effect on my "new" mortgage with FD. So in reality I am in a much better position than most FTB`s are. How the new mortgage processing person explained it was that they can clearly see I can afford the mortgage, but rather than them regard it as a long term mortgage (which is will be), they see it as a bridging loan, and its a company policy not to do bridging loans. Its not a bridging loan by any stretch of the imagination as this is a long term mortgage I will have with them for the next 10 or 15 years. When I sell my current house, some of the money will be used to off-set the new mortgage, but that would still leave a very sizable mortgage for the rest of the term.

I am flabagasted and now am stuck in the situation I have 24days left to get a mortgage sorted out and processed in order to buy my dream house. I thought I was prepared by having mortgage all agreed first with FD, and even double checked it with them. Had they told me straight up that they felt I was a high risk, then I would have gone elsewhere, rather than risk causing any delays in a very tight deadline.

So all in all, not a good experience with FD so far. Now I dont need my current account with them, and am stuck in a limbo process whilst they transfer my DD`s / SO`s and salary over! Argh!

Thrugelmir

Jackinbox99 wrote: »

I am flabagasted and now am stuck in the situation I have 24days left to get a mortgage sorted out and processed in order to buy my dream house. I thought I was prepared by having mortgage all agreed first with FD, and even double checked it with them. Had they told me straight up that they felt I was a high risk, then I would have gone elsewhere, rather than risk causing any delays in a very tight deadline.

So all in all, not a good experience with FD so far. Now I dont need my current account with them, and am stuck in a limbo process whilst they transfer my DD`s / SO`s and salary over! Argh!

From what you've written a lot could be read between the lines so to speak. The fact that you are not selling your existing property would raise questions.

I assume that you've bought a more or less unihabitable repossesion property. Was it at auction?

Jackinbox99

Thrugelmir wrote: »

From what you've written a lot could be read between the lines so to speak. The fact that you are not selling your existing property would raise questions.

I assume that you've bought a more or less unihabitable repossesion property. Was it at auction?

Why would not selling my existing house at the same time as buying the other house raise any concerns tho? As long as i can afford the repayments and have a large amount of equity in the current house.

The new place is habitable, but needs some work on it, which will take a month to sort out. Not only that, ive got so much stuff in my house id prefer to move it over a few weeks. Because I can afford it, it seemed like the easiest stress free way of buying / selling a house.

The new house is not from auction, but the vendors have specified has to be completed within 28days as a condition of accepting my offer.

deanos

Just had a call from a conveyancing company , cant remember the name they wanted to go through security details before they would talk to me , they would not even name the bank they are working for !

Told me they would put the items in the post whatever they are as they would not tell me.

jamesd

Jackinbox99, sorry to read that you've been tripped up by one of their lending rules.

Temrael

Temrael wrote: »

Didn't get a call for some reason, but called them and they apologised for having missed the appointment and said someone would call back. Got a call about 35 mins later.

Got a formal offer! Result!

Our documents and application were received by FD on Monday and yesterday the application went to "Agreed" which was a suprise! :beer:

Lloyds TSB had stitched us up and ommited about two weeks of the statements I had ordered from them so we just sent what we had with a note saying the rest would follow later. I was expecting FD to not look at the application until they had the missing weeks. I also expected that I would have to answer a lot of questions about transactions as we are planning a holiday at the moment and I lost my mum in June and have been settling funeral expenses, distributing the estate etc. I put in a covering letter explaining all that though so I guess that helped. Still (pleasantly) suprised. Maybe how much they look at transactions depends on where your LTV is and affordability etc. which were probably not too bad on.

luckyfool

Jackinbox99 wrote: »

Why would not selling my existing house at the same time as buying the other house raise any concerns tho? As long as i can afford the repayments and have a large amount of equity in the current house.

The new place is habitable, but needs some work on it, which will take a month to sort out. Not only that, ive got so much stuff in my house id prefer to move it over a few weeks. Because I can afford it, it seemed like the easiest stress free way of buying / selling a house.

The new house is not from auction, but the vendors have specified has to be completed within 28days as a condition of accepting my offer.

The perils of using First Direct where you are under a deadline and have non-standard requirements. A good broker should be able to find a lender that will a)not care too much about your old property, and b) actually turn things around quickly and get you a mortgage offer in time for your deadline.

If it "needs some work" because you have high standards and want the place really nice before you move in then fine. If the surveyor highlights issues making the property uninhabitable in its present condition, or serious flaws requiring substantial work then the danger is the lender could hold a retention or even refuse to lend.