My Carrington Carr Home Finance experience

borka26

I am looking to remortgage and release some equity for an extension. My wife went on Money Supermarket and had a look for some deals - then, on Monday, we got a call from Carrington Carr asking when would be good for an adviser to come round. My wife agreed to Wednesday at 8:30 - we were told that the we would get independent advice. Now, I am one of lifes cynics - I never have good first impressions. So, the advisor turns up and starts the pitch. I dont like her - but, knowing nothing about mortgages I thought I would give her a chance and you know what, I started to warm to her. It all went really well - we gave her all the info that she asked for and she said that she would start work for us the very next day and she would have an answer for us before the end of the week. Because we want to move fast, I said yes - that would be great. She explained that she had to see us again within the week as the deal would only last that long. This concerned me, as did the fact that they werent whole of market - but the explanation she gave was very plausible. The next day, I had a call from Carrington Carr. They said that they were from the audit department and that they wanted to know our impression of the adviser and to make sure that we would be available for the appointment. This is when alarm bells started ringing so I did some research. It felt like I was being sold windows. Anyhow, I did my research and found out that they are notorious for charging huge arrangement fees and also pocketing the commission from the lenders. A typical fee is 2.7% and the average fee is 1.95%. Thats a lot of cash. a quick call round a bunch of other brokers and advisers confirmed my suspicions. My face was being ripped off - so, I phoned and explained that before the next appointment, I wanted to know the fees - how were they structured, why they were so high and more importantly, what were the fees they would apply to me. The lady said that she wasnt prepared to share them with me over the phone and that she had sorted my mortgage and had an agreement in principle for me. She went on to explain that she wanted to go through all the numbers with me, not just the fees in isolation. Now, this is my assumption of what was gonna happen next - she was gonna turn up, give me the deal and tell me that I had to sign there and then and that I would be pressured into the mortgage - the hard sell. Again, it felt like I was being sold windows. She went on to explain that she had got managers approval etc to do the deal. 1. its not a deal - its a long term financial commitment 2. I dont like being sold to -I prefer a consultative approach 3. I dont like pushy people 4. I am not going to make decisions without benchmarking - that would be daft! so, I said unless you are prepared to discuss the fees with me right now over the phone, I am canceling the appointment. She still wouldnt explain the fees - so appointment was canceled. Now, I think I have a had a lucky escape - anyone else had a similar experience and why was she so reluctant to discuss the fees?

Rover35

Legally she must give you a KFI which would include all fees both from the lender and adviser. I should advise you get this before allowing some one to score you.

Money supermarket sell leads to anyone who wants to buy them.

You should be able to find any number of good IFA's who don't charge additional fees, are whole of market and are happy to take just the procuration fee off the lender.

GMS

Rover35 wrote: »

Legally she must give you a KFI which would include all fees both from the lender and adviser. I should advise you get this before allowing some one to score you.

Money supermarket sell leads to anyone who wants to buy them.

You should be able to find any number of good IFA's who don't charge additional fees, are whole of market and are happy to take just the procuration fee off the lender.

Initially you should receive an Initial Disclosure Document (IDD) or Combined Initial Disclosure Document (CIDD). CIDD would show both mortgages and insurance.

This would explain fees and charges from the broker. Anything due to the prospective lender would not show here.

A KFI would only be produced when a suitable deal is found. This should reflect the IDD/CIDD for broker charges and will show all charges due to the lender together with information on the product selected.

Always get an IDD/CIDD up front and clarify fees.

haras_nosirrah

4.75% fee - who on earth charges that much and how are they still in business?

betmunch

haras_nosirrah wrote: »

4.75% fee - who on earth charges that much and how are they still in business?

Because they only need to do 2 cases a year!!!!

simon86_2

I am absolutely relieved that forums and posts such as this exist. I have been offered an interview at Carrington Carr as a mortgage advisor but having read these posts and looked at their website I have decided not to.

Kudos to you borka26 for being firm with pressure selling, it's the only way to make sure you're not taken advantage of.

handytips

Ah Carrington Carr. Firstly this proves one thing, the internet is a dangerous playground, the internet CANNOT give you a mortgage quote, WHY ? Its not regulated. Moneysupermarket gathers your info, and in fairness it does say before and after you will be contacted by a mortgage advisor and usually names the company they work for, therefore it should not have been a great surprise that the firm contacted you, especially as the lead could have cost anything up to £50 to the respective broker, this prooves to me that Moneysupermarket can be a little mis leading and i have always said to them that they should have a strap line. BY FILLING IN THIS FORM YOUR DETAILS WILL BE PASSED ON TO A MORTGAGE ADVISOR WHO WILL CONTACT YOU, IF YOU DO NOT WISH TO BE CONTACTED THEN PLEASE DO NOT FILL IN THE FORM. However this is ignored, basically because they are making money from the brokers who are actively looking for business, which is also fair enough, as we are in a very competetive arena. WRT the fees, you should have been given an IDD at the first appointment along with a business card, from the IDD it should explain any brokerage fees, they should also have been explained to you verbally. I make no excuses i charge a brokerage fee and get paid a commission from the lender (usually) if the deal is a Direct deal then i get nothing apart from my brokerage fee and will help all the way with the application process, which believe it or not the vast majority of the general public are unsure of doing themselves and many if they are truthful will admit to messing up an application beyond all belief. For example i charge a fee of £495 on completion, if the case is sub prime (not many of those) then the fee is higher due to the amount of extra work involved. Simple fact of the matter is this, if you think you are getting good value and service for your money go with the broker, as a good broker will save you thousands over the mortgage term. However firms that charge percentages are imo greedy and the fee will vary according to the loan size, the loan size does not matter as it is no more work for a 30k mortgage to a 300k mortgage, i hope this helps people when they are busy searching the Net for deals, another to watch out for is beatthatquote who also take your details and sell them on, dont blame the broker for ringing you he has paid for the information on the back of people filling the forms out online. When i purchased leads many moons ago it was laughable at the differing responses you would get from people, No1 was 'I was only looking for an internet quote', No2 'Why are you phoning me' dooooh No3, I can do this better myself (no you cant) or No4 Yes we have been looking for mortgage advice please come around and see us. Another point of interest for the public is this, the industry average for converting these crap leads is about 1 in 17 which will take a good advisor about a week to phone 17 leads and get hold of the client and thats assuming the lead isnt spurious, which may also indicate why lead or non lead buying brokers charge fees. Good luck whichever way you swing.

ado

Carrington Carr charge a large fee as they pay their advisers generous commission and have a lot of overheads such as a large compliance and telesales departments. Compliance is needed to make sure that the single premium PPI policies sold have watertight demands and needs docs whilst the telesales have to get through a huge number of leads in order to provide each salesman up to 10 appointments per week. Currently they are advertising £40,000 plus ote for their telesales so maybe you can guess what their brokers can earn.

They use a limited panel for mortgages and are tied to one insurance provider and one PPI company. They also have a limited panel for conveyancing and you will not be given any choice over who is used and clients certainly wont be able to use their own solicitor. That also means that there will be no way that you'll be offered any mortgage deals which include free conveyancing. The same goes for valuations. You will use CC's valuers no matter who might normally be used by the mortgage company.

So if you want a high fee, limited panel, limited choice of insurance, expensive conveyancing and valuation fee with a very scripted fact find and sales call then Carrington Carr is probably for you.

handytips

I cannot believe these people are still operating, they will probably come back with, we have many satisfied customers, where it should really read, if you do your mortgage and remortgages with us the amount you owe will stay roughly the same for the term of the loan...lol