Halifax declined mortgage

steve.p09

Hi, I am new to the forum sorry i hope i have posted this in the correct section.

My partner and I wanted to purchase our 1st home so we went to Halifax to apply for a mortgage. Before we did after reading some advise on this forum we checked our credit files (start of last week). I noticed I had a default on equifax which was for a credit card back when I was a student but it was over 6 years ago. Equifax removed this immediately and gave be a months free subscription plus free credit scoring as it should not have been on there or something. I refreshed my score and it went into excellent 531. Experian was already up to date and I have a score of 935 which is good.
No late payments are registered on there and i have a credit card with a balance of £1650 limit is £2500.
The girlfriend noticed 2 late payments on equifax which was again over 6 years old and they removed them and gave the free trail thing etc. She refreshed here score and has good 461. Experian again was fully up to date and she had a score of 999 excellent. As you are probably aware when you log in its all in green on both accounts.

We went to see a senior mortgage consultant at bridge fords who i must say was the most help full chap i met throughout this process (considering he wasn't getting the sale) he said if your happy with the rates at Halifax then go ahead with them, he did offer to give me another quote but because i banked with Halifax and the deal looked decent i thought i would stick with the guys I have been banking with.

We wanted to buy a house for £163k and put down a 10% deposit and we also have a 10k reserve in the bank. We spoke to consultant at bridge-ford who said we could probably borrow up to £225k on our combined salary so we thought its quite a sensible amount £147K which was agreed by him, He also looked into our credit files with us and said he would be astonished if Halifax refused the mortgage and to go back and see him if there are any problems but he really didnt think it would come to that.

Well on Thursday we processed the application and it declined and even the adviser at Halifax was a bit shocked. The advisor said she strongly recommends i appeal so i sent all the credit information over to them last week but after reading some other posts i am wondering if there is much point. They said something about as the credit agencies only updates last month there systems might not have updated??


The advice from the credit agencies. To close my girlfriend’s credit card account as it was inactive no balance on there.
Experian said continue what i am doing its not in excellent just yet because i have only made 1 payment to a new mobile phone contract i took out in October ?

I'm really confused and frustrated with it all as you can probably imagine and i am a bit lost really. If any body has had a similar problems or advice they could share i would be very grateful for your time.

Just to add also the consultant at bridgefords thinks i should appeal also?

Many Thanks

Dave_Ham

I am a bit surprised the nice chap at Bridge-fords is suggesting you approach Halifax directly and even more so appealing.

You are highly likely to be declined at appeal. We all see many a good case that should go through, still fail at appeal as no-one has any real appetite to overturn an appeal as there is no upside for them.

I would suggest you sit down with a decent broker (who may or may not be as nice) but will get you what you want. It all sounds perfectly achievable on the face of it.

As an aside forget the scores Experian/Equifax give you and they are not authorised or regulated to be giving you advice on how best to influence your chances of finance. Cancelling a card is pointless in this situation.

Pay for formal advice and I suspect it will be easier than you imagine.

steve.p09

Hi Dave Ham

Thanks for the reply. The guy from bridgefords was helpfull and he did offer to help me out with other products life insurance etc. I said i was adamant i wanted to apply for my mortgage with the halifax directly and was happy with the rates ect

I suspect your right, i am not expecting anything from the appeal so looks like i may have to get some independant advise as i am stuck for what to do at the moment.

Many Thanks

chanz4

Whats your income, how long you been in work, address, bank etc

kingstreet

Remember - Countrywide;-

has only a limited panel of lenders
charges you a fee
is tied to one protection provider
is tied to one general insurer
pushes its expensive conveyancing service
pushes its survey services.

Be careful of the service you get, versus what you think you are getting.

Foxy-Stoat_3

I went for a first time mortgage with Halifax on the High Street with 25% deposit - computer says no....went through a broker and got a mortgage with Halifax at the standard rates....go figure that one out!

alwaystryyourbest

Hi we went into Santander and tried to get mortgage, they said no,but then went through a morgage broker and Santander said yes ..
So our new morgage is with Santander..
It would of been nice for Santander to say yes 1st time as I have had to pay a extra £500 for a mortgage broker...

Good luck with getting mortgage ...

Emilymay86

Does anyone know what percentage of mortgages are declined after agreement in principle is given?? I don't know whether to arrange a survey before I have a certified offer as Ido t want to waste money x

Foxy-Stoat_3

Emilymay86 wrote: »

Does anyone know what percentage of mortgages are declined after agreement in principle is given?? I don't know whether to arrange a survey before I have a certified offer as Ido t want to waste money x

Doubt you will get an answer to that question.

opinions4u

Emilymay86 wrote: »

Does anyone know what percentage of mortgages are declined after agreement in principle is given?? I don't know whether to arrange a survey before I have a certified offer as Ido t want to waste money x

Well you won't get an offer without a survey.

But when I worked for them very few turned from pass to fail. I'd guess below 10%. Some years ago now though.

Emilymay86

opinions4u wrote: »

Well you won't get an offer without a survey.

But when I worked for them very few turned from pass to fail. I'd guess below 10%. Some years ago now though.

I mean a home buyers survey- I know I will need the valuation survey done but I want a separate home buyers done x