First time buyer confusion!

beki_jade

I expected buying my first house to be stressful, hard work and expensive but its reached the stage that at almost 1am I am on a forum asking for advice in an attempt not to cry!


Trying to buy a mid terrace little house in rural Yorkshire. Sadly as is often the case its a deceased estate so no chain to worry about. Saw the house, fell in love, put on a offer, had it accepted, phoned mortgage advisor to start the ball rolling, phoned solicitor to start that ball rolling and off we set. That was the beginning of Dec and I have still not even reached contract exchange. My solicitor was fast, had the price list agreed the terms and I instructed them to crack on. Mortgage deal came through, West Brom, £420 fee, £99 set up fee and free valuation. Great off we go. Since then they added another £20 for admin costs, and the best bit £330 to pay their solicitor to check my solicitors paperwork. So I am stuck as im already started, cant back out of anything or risk loosing my house so I have to agree to pay them. I am confused as to what I am paying the West Broms solicitor for so I drop them an email asking if they could outline what the £330 pays for. Hoping to be honest that there will be something in that fee that I can persuade my solicitor to drop off the fees and claw some cash back. What comes back?! An email to tell me that the West Brom is their client not me and they will not speak to me. Silly me im only the person paying you, sorry. So wait a few more weeks, because of course their solicitor has a 10 working day turn around period. So everything I sign goes to my solicitor to approve who posts it to theirs, who sit on it then post it back to mine and so on. Now this weeks letter, I have to secure buildings insurance and post the policy documents (for a house I haven't even exchanged contracts on) to my solicitor to send to their solicitor to check its suitable cover for the house OH and pay them another £20 for the honour of them checking its suitability. They would also like me to sign a Power of Attorney document giving the West Broms solicitor powers over my legal concerns for the next 12 months so they can complete on my house on my behalf. They haven't even bothered to put in which solicitor im giving the power to its a list of everyone who works there, maybe the cleaner for all I know.


So im broke and confused and the West Brom are just fobbing me off and ignoring me and mortgage advisor says its to late to do anything about it. Im scared as I sit here watching the new boiler money disappear rapidly, worried what rubbish excuse to extort more money the west brom will come up with next and terrified that the sellers may, understandably, walk away soon. My questions to anyone who read this far are: 1. Is it normal to sign a power of attorney for 12 months for house purchase, if at all? 2. Has anyone used the West Brom and know if I am in for anymore stings? 3. Please has anyone any advice, people at work just keep telling me it doesn't sound normal, but that's not much help when you have no idea what normal should be!!!


Sorry for the very long feed, one very confused very upset and getting very angry girl on her laptop at 1am!!

UsernameAlreadyExists

beki_jade wrote: »

1. Is it normal to sign a power of attorney for 12 months for house purchase, if at all?

Absolutely not.

kingstreet

Why have you ended up with a solicitor acting for you and another acting for the lender?

Was your solicitor not on the lender's panel?

How did you arrange this mortgage, direct with lender or via a broker? If the latter why was this not sorted by the broker?

Let_Us_See

Some very strange antics here. I suggest you have 'words' with mortgage adviser and solicitor to understand what has transpired.

beki_jade

The mortgage was arranged via a mortgage advisor, I have only spoken to the West Brom directly in an attempt to seek clarity on the fees.


My solicitor was decided before I had the mortgage and my mortgage advisor had all the details. At the point of instructing my solicitor I was taking a mortgage with the HSBC (I think), I was then changed several times and ended up with the West Brom. I was told that the West Brom had not told my mortgage advisor about this legal requirement until later in the day and it was to late. I complained that the fees piling in where not on the summary of fees sheet I was issued but was told that even with the now additional fees she could no longer get me a cheaper mortgage than the current one.


I am sure this is all laughable and I have messed up somewhere along the line, but as I said as a first time buyer I have, perhaps foolishly, gone with the advice give. I was 4 weeks into the normal process with the West Brom (by that I mean the one I read about when I research) with only two solicitors when I was forced to take this third one on board!


And todays kick in the teeth?! The West Broms solicitors want paying and want permission to have my solicitor take it from the bank. My solicitors will charge me 3% to take the cash from my bank, then West Broms solicitors will charge me 2.5% to take it from theirs! Cheque it is then, whats another week?!

kingstreet

Right.

So, how was your solicitor selected?

How did you find your mortgage "advisor?"

Why West Bromwich BS?

beki_jade

Solicitor was selected as they have undertaken all legal work for my family and dads firm for years. They and the mortgage advisor have undertaken all the purchases for my family in the last couple of years, which is quite a few as we are all just starting to first time buy. No one else has had any problems!


The mortgage advisor sent through the summary sheet for the West Brom saying it was her recommendation. It read well, I did a quick bit of reading online, it all seemed fine so I said yes. There was no mention of legal fees on the summary sheet, nor was there any mention in the packup that came through.

kingstreet

In which case, I would be asking this advisor if any check was made to see if the recommended solicitor was on the WBBS panel?

If it had been checked and revealed the solicitor wasn't, you should then have been given the opportunity to find another solicitor which was on the panel where you could have established there would be just one set of costs, rather than two.

BTW the usual fee for moving money is about £35 for a CHAPS payment, so I have no idea where this 3% or 2.5% has come from. Were these figures quoted at the outset?

TBH it sounds like a right dog's dinner and I'm embarrassed that a professional has not dealt with this stuff in a timely manner. Where you go from here, I don't know.

beki_jade

Paperwork states that CHAPS payment method is only used for the transfer of the big part, stamp duty and deposit. Which no surprises is going to cost me £35 for my solicitor and £30 for theirs! The percentage charges were outlined at the start and have been charged all along as money has been required for searches etc, although thankfully these only hit me once as my solicitor did all the work.


Thank you so much for your advice, I think I am stuck at the minute but once everything is sorted I will start trying to find out where the mess up occurred. Im soooooo glad im not going mad and this is nothing normal!!

Jenniefour

Kingstreet, do you know what the Power of Attorney is needed for here?

When I read OP's post I struggled to recognise a lot of what's gone on as anything resembling a normal house buying process and wondered if this is some new scam.

kingstreet

Not a clue, TBH.