Remortgage forgeries by husband

frugal_lass

Hello all

My mother and I are in a difficult situation. Since I can remember my father has been gambling extensively and it all came to a head in 2005 when he had forged my mother's signature to remortgage the house. My mother has made all repayments and he doesn't do anything towards paying the finances.

We want out of this destructive environment as he is abusive. We still have a £37,000 mortgage on the property (would not be there at all if it wasn't for him). We don't really have much money for solicitors as he's cleared Mum's savings in her personal account many times and now she hardly has anything left over after paying the bills to save.

We desperately need advice as we can't bear to live with him for any longer and need to get away! Any advice from you clever people to achieve our goal of living happily away from him either in our current home (which we are able to afford) or elsewhere. Tips on the following needed please:

- How to protect ourselves from further identity fraud (there are three forgery documents that we know of).

- I have an appointment with a solicitor next week - any idea of our options?
If we just leave the house and he doesn't pay the mortgage I assume my Mum's credit report will be negatively affected?

- Anyone have any experience of occupation orders? Ideally my mother and I would stay here and then we'd sell the house. It seems hardly fair that he gets a share as she's paid the mortgage for more than 11 years and not received a penny from the remortgage loans.


Sorry if the above is waffly - hope it makes sense and thank you in advance. The situation is intolerable and my father is going to be aggressive or even violent if he feels backed into a corner. We've always been submissive and he won't be able to handle that we're taking action against him. We need advice on our next step!

holly_hobby

Firstly, I am so sorry for the situation you and especially Mum find yourselves in - I and others willl try and help as much as possible.

Re - mortgage application.

One way of dealing with this could be to actually report the fraudulent action of your Father to the lender - and let them decide what form of action they will take, which could well be criminal.

However, they may argue that your although your Father submitted a fraudulent application, your Mother has despite knowledge of this, failed to subsequently report it and has indeed maintained the mge repayments (although it could be viewed that this was her acting responsibly despite the circs). Which the lender may cite indicates that she was complicent in the execution/on going fraudulent app in place.

I assume this is a joint mortgage held as joint tenants - generally in this circ both parties are jointly and severally liable for the debt, and share in proceeds upon disposal, so if Mum moves out and leaves him to his own devices, you can probably eventually expect a repo order, and Mum being chased for any loss (for up to 12 yrs).

You need to financially separate Mum from Dad - so you need to get him removed from the mge and deeds (which will generally be assessed on Mums earned income, and no doubt is easier said than done, as removal from the mge will require Dads consent, which may not be forthcoming if it leaves him homeless).

If this is not forthcoming, legal separation/divorce will be the only way to do this - in that a judge will make the decision on retained occupation - although without dependants they may just instruct the property to be sold. (but I'm not a family law solicitor - which is whom I presume your forthcoming appointment is with)

These are all future actions, if your Father is violent or prone to be so, you need to remove yourself and Mum from the situation - there are refuges that will help whilst you remove yourself from the situation and legally sort everything out.

To protect yourself from ID fraud - Mum needs to immediately notify all the CRAs (experian, equifax etc), that they are been attempted/successful fraud applications - they should put a note of interest on her record to alert potential financiers of the situation, whereby they will impose further ID checks before considering any financial application.

Hope this helps a little ...

Holly

maninthestreet

Both you and your mother need to register with CIFAS, to prevent any further identity theft or fraud:

http://www.cifas.org.uk/identity_fraud

frugal_lass

Thank you for your helpful replies. We are going to organise mediation once my Dad is back from holiday. We will also register with CIFAS, it's a reasonable cost for the service. Have checked Experian report and the situation isn't as dire as I imagined. But the thorough lack of trust means we have to get things sorted a.s.a.p.

I can't live with him as he's such a bully and it's getting on my nerves but leaving mum with him is like leaving her in a lion's den. Please wish us luck so we can get away and my mum can finally have the peace she deserves.