Mortgage fees??

TenBubbles

Our mortgage adviser helped select a few products (see https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4232971) and we asked for a copy of Keyfacts for one of them: 5-year fixed from Abbey (Santander), LVT - 49%, rate - 3.19%.

Had a look at the document and noticed that there are quite a few fees that we need to pay:
- Booking fee: £1495
- Mortgage account fee: £225
- Telegraphic transfer: £35
- Broker's fee: £650
- Lenders Conveyancing Fee payable to Solicitor: £126

So my questions are:
1. £1495 booking fee is not refundable! Our combined salary last year is £64k, but I'm self-employed for 2.5 years. Is Abbey freelancer-friendly? Are we taking a big risk by paying a hefty booking fee?

2. Mortgage account fee. Never heard of this (total newbie ) Does this apply to other mortgage products as well?

3. Is the broker's fee reasonable? (We are borrowing 133k) He mentioned that their fee will does depend on the loan amount, but would cap it fee to £650 and that if there is room to reduce it he will. I wonder what that means??

4. For 'Lenders Conveyancing Fee payable to Solicitor', it mentioned that A non-refundable legal fee must be paid to your conveyancer before the mortgage starts. The amount shown here is an estimate for the work carried out by the conveyancer for Abbey for looking into the legal title. The total charge to you will be higher as it will also include work for yourself alone.' We are using our own conveyancer, so I guess £126 is all we need to pay and the underlined part is not relevant in our case?

5. In section 13 it says: 'Using a mortgage intermediary
Abbey, a brand of Santander UK plc (the lender) will pay PMS a fee of £665.00 if you take out this mortgage.' What does this mean?

Anyone help please～～～?

p.s. We're also paying about £1300 to our conveyancer. So that's a total amount of £3800!! :eek::eek: :eek: I'm going away to weep in the corner now...

rach83

Hi

I have been having the same dilemma with Abbey and their booking fee. Although reading their website I am led to believe that the fee would be refundable if the mortgage was declined prior to valuation. It is still a crazy amount of money to pay. A broker fee of £650 seems steep. I think I was quoted about £300 and we were going to be borrowing roughly the same amount as you. I believe there are some brokers around who get their whole fee from the lender might be worth seeing if you can find a broker who works on that basis.

Abbey seem very cloak and dagger to me but they seem to be the only lender who is lenient when it comes to non conventional incomes. Have you spoken to Santander direct seeing as Abbey basically are Santander.

worried_jim

Just to add a side note, I have had an Abbey mortgage for 10 years. I have changed the deal that I am on twice myself and have done directly by calling them, there staff have been very helpful to talk to at the call centre and whilst it is not their job to advise they are very friendly and knowledgable and I have been very satisfied with their service. Good luck.

TenBubbles

It seems to me that our broker will get commission from the bank if we take out this mortgage, and I remember reading somewhere that some of the mortgage brokers will offer to offset some of the commission earned against the cost of your deal.

Is this the case? £3800 is not a small amount of money, so just trying to save as much as I can but I'm worried that he might be offended if I asked him to offset? :huh:

gaz141

my total bill was £1200.00, lawyers fees, everything. My broker got paid a commission by the mortgage provider, it's all in the Key Facts. Did you see BBC Watchdog tonight about outrageous booking fees and how they can be more expensive over the long term

g_attrill

Is PMS your broker? It looks like they are getting a commission and charging you a fee. £1,315 sounds like an extraordinarily large fee for arranging a mortgage, rough guess I would have thought £300-400 is usual even if they don't get commission? Your rate is pretty good so it doesn't sound like you are a difficult case!

TenBubbles

gaz141 wrote: »

Did you see BBC Watchdog tonight about outrageous booking fees and how they can be more expensive over the long term

Yeah we did! We were talking about Santander, then switched on TV and they were talking about it too! :rotfl:

Yeah £3800 sounds scary... Have sent the broker an email to see whether he is lower his fee if we go for this product.

TenBubbles

g_attrill wrote: »

Is PMS your broker? It looks like they are getting a commission and charging you a fee. £1,315 sounds like an extraordinarily large fee for arranging a mortgage, rough guess I would have thought £300-400 is usual even if they don't get commission? Your rate is pretty good so it doesn't sound like you are a difficult case!

The difficult part of our case is that I only had two years of self-employed account under my belt. I haven't checked my credit score yet (not on electoral roll, not sure whether this will affect my score), but I wasn't able to get a mobile phone contract after they checked my score in the shop - although later I called HSBC for another matter, and asked about my credit rating and was told it was ranked 'perfect' (or something like that) in their system!

Dave_Ham

It sounds like you may need some help, not being able to get a mobile phone contract and then wanting a mortgage?

For me, fee would depend upon service levels and stress levels.

Fees are topical as the client may not see what goes on behind the scenes. Your situation is not straightforward.

When considering fees, I would take the following into account.

• Are they available to talk or answer questions when you need them, outside of office hours?
• Have they supported you through the process, helping with managing Estate Agents, Solicitors and holding your hand through the process?
• Have you got a better deal than you would have got yourself?

Forget the £3800 figure, either the product fee at £1,495 gives you a better rate than one with a fee of £495 or not. This is why you pay a broker to calculate these figures, although they should explain to you why they have recommended this product.

You should really have checked your credit files in advance and had I been the broker and you told me about the mobile phone decline, I would have enforced it as otherwise wasting time all round.

I wish you well, my question to the broker would have been can you justify your fee please?

I would always have had this conversation upfront and would happily explain why the fee is higher/lower than typical fees are.

Let us know - good luck

TenBubbles

Thanks Dave!

That's the part that I didn't understand. When I wanted to sign up for a mobile contract, I had a healthy amount of savings (over 30k), good income, never had late payment or missed payment...the only thing is that I had started freelancing and was not on the electoral roll.

And then HSBC told me my credit score in their system looks great (couldn't tell me any details though).

Anyway, I'll mention it to my broker and see what he says.

As to the fee, he replied 'We also receive a fee from the lender as a % of the loan amount. Since we were first in touch your loan amount has fallen as you are putting down a larger deposit. This is great for you, but also reduces the fee that we receive from the lender. When quoting you a fee I take both the work involved and mortgage size into account to arrive at the fee we will charge. I hope you can see that we provide a really personal and prompt service which is why we need to charge fees. As a small gesture I will reduce the fee to £600 but we would really struggle to go any lower. I hope that this is acceptable.'

To be honest, he seems to be a very good guy, always responding quickly (shockingly quickly in fact) and have answered tons of our questions so far. We wouldn't have thought of checking out Abbey, so he's helpful with selecting products for us. It's just that £3800 is an eye-watering figure as we're really stretched now. And we had to save wherever possible.

Which website should I use to check my credit files? Haven't really done this coz I was told checking it may affect my score?

Dave_Ham

It does not affect your score at all to check once in a while and is good practice.

Experian, Equifax and Call Credit. You only need the £2 versions...