Britannia mortgage for tenement in Scotland

roryf

Hello,

Trying to get a mortgage from Britannia for purchase of a traditional tenement flat in Edinburgh. I've previously had a Britannia mortgage for an Edinburgh flat, although it was a warehouse conversion rather than an older tenement.

The person I spoke to in their call centre was adamant that the property had to have a management company in place and a certain number of years left on the lease. Despite me explaining multiple times that the leasehold tenure was not common in older Scottish properties, they would not budge.

The home report survey ticks the box 'Absolute Ownership', with the only other option being 'Leasehold'. I'm having a bit of trouble understanding what I should explain to them on this. I'm aware that the Feudal system was abolished in 2000 and of the Tenement Act 2004, but this doesn't explain what the 'official' tenure should be of the property.

I had the same discussion with them a few years ago with a previous property, but the person I spoke to then seemed to be a bit more clued up. Has anyone had experience of this with Britannia or another non-Scotland-based lender?

I'm obviously going to ask my solicitor about this, just wondering what other experiences people have had.

Cheers

roryf

In case anyone comes across this, managed to resolve in the end.

Basically the person (or people, my wife and I spoke to 4 over the course of the application) in the call centre didn't know what they were talking about. Despite my explaining to them in simple logical terms, i.e. leasehold is unusual in Scotland, especially in older properties, you do lend to Scotland don't you? Oh good, then you must accept non-leasehold properties... They kept insisting that "it must have a management company in place with x number of years left on the lease". When explained the shared responsibility situation (as written into deeds and various property laws) my wife actually had this exchange:
them: "then what happens when something needs repaired?"
us: "we organise it with the neighbours"
them: "oh..."

In the end we had the foresight to insist they speak to their underwriters about it specifically, and low and behold it was all okay and we could proceed. We had to be pretty forceful with them to get this, which we didn't enjoy doing.

A shame because my previous encounter with Britannia the person knew exactly what I was talking about, they still had to confirm with the underwriters but they did this of their own accord and there was no hassle at all. Moral of the story, just because you're dealing with a large sum of money don't expect the person you speak to to know any more than you. Insist they talk to someone that does.