Barratts dream start help desperately needed - we may be forced to sell our home

Thrugelmir

Cheeky_smiler wrote: »

I've sent two valuations

Prepared by who and under your instructions presumably. Hardly independent nor professional I suspect.

Barrett's are refusing the valuation on the grounds it's low and want me to pay out for a surveyor.

Standard way of conducting business. Little point in moaning and groaning. Accept it and move on.

silvercar

GwylimT wrote: »

One of my brothers did this, but as be realised he would unlikely to be able to increase his mortgage by £30k so instead of over paying his mortgage he saved every penny for five years so when the time came he could pay off.

If you have the self discipline, this is the way to go.

If you take a repayment mortgage and/or overpay the mortgage, you are at the whim of the lenders whether they will lend you the money when you need to remortgage to pay back the loan. Taking an interest only mortgage and setting money aside each month to meet the loan repayment leaves you in control.

jhoward13

Hello.. I realise the comments are not recent but if anyone is still reading this I would be interested to know how you have got on with Barratts. I have been trying to work with them to come to an agreement and I haven't been able to get anything affordable from them - not like the £4k settlement discussed in this forum.

I bought my 'nightmare start' 1 bed flat in 2007 when I was 27 and paid £120k for it I've been trying to sell it for the last 6 months now the housing market has recovered in the main as I would like to start a family. I have been unable to sell the property for even £75k so clearly this is a massive loss. For all those people saying pay down the mortgage and cut back I would like to advise that this alone isn't likely to solve this problem. I have been paying the mortgage down and pretty well having no life so I can save as much as possible so moving is possible. To add insult to injury on my development when the property crash happened 11 of the 69 apartments were sold off to the council (over and above the socical housing that was already accounted for on the development). This was done in 2008 and they were all sold off at £30k. Now nobody on the site barr one has ever been able to sell these properties at a reasonable price. Therefore despite me being fiscally responsible and having paid down my mortgage as much as possible I am still in the position of not being able to afford to move and Barratts are most unhelpful with the situation.

I would like to know if anyone has had any success please as I was advised that the settlement price was not up negotaions and I should get an independant RICS surveyor to value the property at my cost if I disagreed with them.

Thank you in hopeful advance!!

AesopsAnt02

Hi jhoward13, sorry to hear about your struggles with negotiations. I posted earlier in the thread about a family member of mine who is in a similar position (I couldn't log in as AesopsAnt for some reason this time, so now I'm AesopsAnt02!).

Can I just ask, what have your negotiation tactics been? The case with my family member at the moment is that she's trying to save and over-pay the mortgage as much as possible, as it sounds like you're doing, in order to try and get 10-15% equity in the next 2 years for the purpose of re-mortgaging to cover the Barratt loan debt. Are Barratt saying to you that you need to re-mortgage to cover the full amount owed to them (25% of current market value) and they won't accept anything lower than that? My family member has not yet contacted Barratt regarding a reduction, but she's "heard of" a friend of a friend paying a reduced settlement.

My OH and I have discussed the issue as relating to my family member, and we think a possible alternative would be to save as much as possible in cash, instead of overpaying the mortgage, then when the time comes to repay the Barratt loan, offer them the amount of cash that has been saved, rather than paying them with more borrowed money. The idea behind this is that this way:
-there is unlikely to be much visible equity in the property if no overpayments on the mortgage are made, so it won't be worth Barratt trying to pursue a re-possession, as they are unlikely to get anything after the 1st charge to the mortgage provider has been paid off.
-if Barratt refuse the cash offer, of whatever it may be (possibly around 50% of what is owed according to the contract), the saved money can still be put towards a re-mortgage in order to raise the extra money needed to swallow the debt, so the only loss to my family member will be due to the fact that savings interest rates are very low. This re-mortgage could of course also be refused.

The above is just an idea, and I'm keen to hear arguments against it.

jhoward13

Hi AesopsAnt02.. thank you for picking up on this!

I have attempted negotoiations with them by first putting the property on the market to sell.. starting at a higher point and testing the market out in a number of stages for the last 6/7 months. I genuinely need to move but I got to a point where it was no longer an affordable option because the losses meant I would be over stretching myself even to get a property of £125k value due to the monthly cost and the deposit available. I have rang them a few time to discuss (I also did this in 2012 at which time they still overvalued the settlement fee by quite a large proportion). the call centre are no help they are just people with a script, its not their fault but it does make things more frustrating when they tell you its a good offer but they have no concept of the real issues and that it actually isn't! The call centre seem to centre on the 'great discount' despite the losses, your personal financial situation.. ie they are overly interested in whats outstanding on my mortgage and telling me I need to seek help if I have finacail issues! I don't have financial issues other than the noose of their second charge! I feel for those that do.. it must be so much worse for them.

They starting 'losing' my emails so the last couple of communciations bar a phone call have been in a written letter form, sent recorded delivery so they cannot say they haven't received it. I have managed to get the figure negotiated down to the equivelent of £75k.. not that I managed to sell at this level..but my problem with them being on this matter that they have contributed to the decline in the value with their deal with the local council. They refuse to do a deal with me to compensate for their actions. I understand that I was a green first time buyer but at the same time they took advantage of that which in itself is wrong. When I wrote the letters I collated evidence to back up my case ie the list of sold prices the advertising documents produced by the estate agents, the Rightmove stats. My aim being to show them I had done everything I could think of my end and to request that something was extended to manage the isuse. I would need to remortage for the full amount to re pay them should I move and due to recent mobility issues I need somewhere with less or no stairs at all as they are a daily struggle for me.

I think your idea is a sound idea because whilst you will be paying interest on the mortgage if your mortgage is portal like mine is then you can transfer a higher value at a lesser rate when you move. So there is definate merit to it and I must confess it is what I have been doing myself for the last 9 months. I haven't saved enough for a deposit without some from the sale yet though, particualry when you take into consideration moving costs are proving to be approximately £4500-5000. I have paid approx 40% of my mortage off in 7.5 years but because of the steep losses this isn't enough. I'm not a quitter but I must admit I am struggling to find a solution to this issue without some flexibility from Barratts.

I thought I saw someone on here had managed to get their 2nd charge paid off for £4k. I put a cheeky offer in at £9k for both mine and my brothers (yes we are both in the same position..double whammy) whichwas duly ignored by Barratts (the orginal second charge was for £30k). I'm hoping to recoup some losses and not get stung twice..if the market falls and I've not sold but bought it out I could be stung again

It may well be that I have to sacrifce my life long hope to have a family and suffer being trapped in a home that was meant to be a 2 year stepping stone.

AesopsAnt02

This is worrying, as it sounds like Barratts are not willing to negotiate at all, and they've put up barriers in the form of call centres to deal with unhappy customers.

I feel bad for you jhoward13, as I can see the impossibility of moving on with your life whilst still living in a small flat. Is there any possibility that you could rent out your flat in the medium term to cover the mortgage (and possibly a bit more) and become a renter yourself in a family sized house?

In some ways my family member's situation is preferable to yours, as hers is a reasonably sized house close to work and family, but in others it's worse; negative equity, and she does have other debt. Since it sounds like Barratt are unwilling to negotiate, I think the very best case scenario for my family member is a lot of years repaying the loan at a high rate of interest.

I really hope the tables turn for you soon, and you get to move on!

LMJ10

Hi, I'm a similar situation but with a David Wilson house

Got a similar offer however my shared equity is 15% I brought my house in 2009 for 145k and now it is valued at a whooping £165k good news
Unfortunately we have had to go into a DMP, gutted cuz I'd love to sell and move to a bigger place

Rose equity own the share now and they offer me all sorts of offers ranging from 15-20% off what I brought it for and most recently off the a recent valuation
I am aiming to save up in the next 3 years money to offer them a settlement as it would mean paying 2 years early.

What I'm interested to know is has anyone failed to pay in the 10 years - what's happened - were u forced to sell? Go on a payment plan??

silvercar

What I'm interested to know is has anyone failed to pay in the 10 years - what's happened - were u forced to sell? Go on a payment plan??

If the shared equity is secured on your home, either as a second charge or as part of the main mortgage, the lender can repossess.

If it is an unsecured loan, the lender could secure a repayment plan through the courts, they could try and get the loan secured as a second charge on the property and then go to repossess.

In your case, Rose equity could try and get the loan secured on the property.

kingstreet

The equity loan is already secured over the property by way of second charge.

This, together with the likes of FirstBuy is the forerunner of HTB - Equity Loan.

joolsyp

What would the lender gain by repossessing if there is significant negative equity? In my case the first lender/mortgage company has to be paid off first which means the second lender would stand to lose way more through a repossession than coming to an agreement with the owner (either a lump sum or extension to the terms of the loan).

silvercar wrote: »

If the shared equity is secured on your home, either as a second charge or as part of the main mortgage, the lender can repossess.