Nationwide Save To Buy account - How to release deposit from account before Exchange?

Carrotline

This is probably a stupid and obvious question, but I'm a fairly clueless first time buyer and I've got a question about how we need to organise our funds ahead of exchange.

The last of the outstanding legal bits have been sorted now, and have been told by our solicitor to prepare to come in and "sign something" later this week.

And this has got me thinking about where I need to put my money ahead of exchange.

You see, we've applied for a Nationwide 5% Save To Buy mortgage and all of our deposit (and a bit extra) is tied up in that savings account. Now, when it comes to handing over our deposit, how do we go about transferring that money?

Should I move it to my current account and then pay it over like that, or does Nationwide release it on our behalf from the Save to Buy account?

Apologies if this all sounds terribly naive and stupid, but we've had so many delays/problems getting to this point, I'm petrified of anything going wrong and just want to make sure we've done everything right.

Building_Surveyor

Why would you need to transfer it to your current account?

Carrotline

Building_Surveyor wrote: »

Why would you need to transfer it to your current account?

Now that was a genuinely daft question, on my part, because you can't transfer any money out of the Save To Buy once you've paid it in.

So, my (slightly) amended question is, how do we go about paying out our deposit in time for Exchange if Nationwide won't allow payments out of the account?

Thrugelmir

You will need to contact the Nationwide to authorise the closure of the account and to transfer the balance to the bank account as advised by your solicitor.

Carrotline

Thrugelmir wrote: »

You will need to contact the Nationwide to authorise the closure of the account and to transfer the balance to the bank account as advised by your solicitor.

Thanks for sharing. We're going into sign the contract next Monday, so was getting anxious to find out what we should do.

Out of interest, does anyone know how far in advance of Exchange we should contact Nationwide about closing the account and getting the deposit amount transferred?

TeamLowe

If you go into branch to do it and the payment is below their faster payments limit it'll be done that day, or you could pay for a CHAPS if over the limit, which I think is 10k

FYI it can only be done in branch and you'll need the passbook- or at least you did for the ISA

tom1984

Hi I had this the week before last and was thinking exactly the same. The problem is that closing the account is the only way of getting the funds out and if for any reason the purchase falls thru then reapplying using the 5% deposit/incentives is not possible. Seems like a flaw in the system to me.
I closed the account on the day the solicitor told me the vendor had given authority to exchange and not before! This has to be done in branch and the funds are transferred to your current account immediately. As a previous poster said anything over 10k cannot be sent in one payment. We sent 2 seperate payments of around 6-7k to our solicitor to avoids chaps delays/charges. Good luck!

amnblog

Interesting.

It sounds like Nationwide have not put any real thought into the mechanics.

Did you have to go into branch on the day to make this happen?

Carrotline

tom1984 wrote: »

Hi I had this the week before last and was thinking exactly the same. The problem is that closing the account is the only way of getting the funds out and if for any reason the purchase falls thru then reapplying using the 5% deposit/incentives is not possible. Seems like a flaw in the system to me.

I'll say. Already had one house purchase fall through (at the valuation stage), so I'm hoping the odds are stacked in our favour on this one. But, still, seems a bit of a cack-handed way of running things.

tom1984 wrote: »

I closed the account on the day the solicitor told me the vendor had given authority to exchange and not before! This has to be done in branch and the funds are transferred to your current account immediately.

Did you have to book an appointment with your mortgage adviser to do this, or can anyone in the branch do it?

tom1984 wrote: »

As a previous poster said anything over 10k cannot be sent in one payment. We sent 2 seperate payments of around 6-7k to our solicitor to avoids chaps delays/charges. Good luck!

Ok. We've got about £14,000 in the STB savings account, but we're only putting down a deposit of £9,750, so we're just clear of the threshold, thank goodness!

Thanks for sharing your experience with me. Perhaps my question isn't so daft after all.

TeamLowe

tom1984 wrote: »

Hi I had this the week before last and was thinking exactly the same. The problem is that closing the account is the only way of getting the funds out and if for any reason the purchase falls thru then reapplying using the 5% deposit/incentives is not possible. Seems like a flaw in the system to me.
I closed the account on the day the solicitor told me the vendor had given authority to exchange and not before! This has to be done in branch and the funds are transferred to your current account immediately. As a previous poster said anything over 10k cannot be sent in one payment. We sent 2 seperate payments of around 6-7k to our solicitor to avoids chaps delays/charges. Good luck!

Who said you couldn't reapplyif the first purchase fell through? Just curious as We was told by our mortgage adviser that we could bit would have to pay for valuation fee if we had it free the first time and the product fee again if it had been more than three months and this was when the deposit was sat with the solicitors so account already closed