Santander refusing to take wives income into account

Rmphotography

So we had a meeting with our independent mortgage broker who looked through the offers available and recommended that we go with santander.
We completed the forms and got a mortgage in principle acceptance almost right away.
8 weeks later and we heard from the broker today that because my wife is employed directly by a family to look after a guy with severe learning difficulties that they aren't willing to take her income into account.
Really frustrated by this as she has been working with the same employer for 6 years and the guy has a normal life expectancy but because they are saying that her income is funded by benefits that he receives they are unwilling to use it in their calculations of how much we can borrow.
We haven't had any bad credit history in the past, no late payments, we were overpaying our mortgage and now we are such in the situation of having annoyed the person selling the house we were interested in we have now been turned down for the mortgage due to a pathetic reason from the bank!
REALLY REALLY stressed so any help would be appreciated!!

kingstreet

Change lender.

Nothing else to suggest.

Muscle750

Loads more out there and reading your wife is in effect self employed however I'm surprised on the ruling that her income is funded by benefits

kingstreet

Presumably her employer receives direct payments from his local authority and has decided to employ his own carer.

Provided all the formalities are adhered to, payslips and P60 issued and the correct returns and payments made to HMRC I don't really see the lender's problem.

It does not closely scrutinise other applicants' employers, so why this one?

Rmphotography

kingstreet wrote: »

Presumably her employer receives direct payments from his local authority and has decided to employ his own carer.

Provided all the formalities are adhered to, payslips and P60 issued and the correct returns and payments made to HMRC I don't really see the lender's problem.

It does not closely scrutinise other applicants' employers, so why this one?

This is exactly how it is funded, the family get a care package for him through direct payments and then employ a team of 3 carers.
My wife has been there for 6 years, paid tax and ni, had p60s but for some reason they are saying the job isn't secure as he could have his benefits withdrawn. If they took one look at the guy they would see that it is a lifelong condition and he's never going to recover and will need care all his life.

People could be made redundant next week if things go wrong with the company that they work for but santander seem to like that as they have "a proper employer", whereas with the care my wife provides for this guy I would argue there is more reliability that she will be in the post as he is going to need care in the future and for the rest of his life.

The mortgage broker is apparently arguing this point with the bank lending manager in hope that they will reverse their decision on this but I'm not holding out much hope. I think that one they have said no then that is it, I'm just worried how a rejection on a mortgage claim (which isn't for bad credit) will look to the next lender apply to.

kingstreet

There is no recorded rejection, so it has no impact.

ethank

Who is her employer? What does the name of the employer say on her payslips and P60's?
Is she payrolling herself? Who is doing this?

kingstreet

ethank wrote: »

Who is her employer? What does the name of the employer say on her payslips and P60's?
Is she payrolling herself? Who is doing this?

The "service user" is the employer and his/her name would be the employer name on payslips and P60.

It's one of the problems of direct payments, particularly for the elderly. How many 80 year olds want the responsibility of being an employer?

However, that's a bit OT for this thread.

Rmphotography

ethank wrote: »

Who is her employer? What does the name of the employer say on her payslips and P60's?
Is she payrolling herself? Who is doing this?

Her employer on her payslips and P60 is the name of the guy she looks after.
He is also her employer however his mum has power of attorney and makes the decisions due to his illnesses.
The payroll is carried out by the family and not by my wife.

Rmphotography

kingstreet wrote: »

How many 80 year olds want the responsibility of being an employer?

This is another thing that gets me, the guy who my wife looks after is 30. I think lenders see the job title of "carer" and automatically think elderly and that they could die any minute. Reality is he will most likely still be going strong at the end of the mortgage period and not about to pop his clogs.

kingstreet

My wife is an area Team Leader for our local integrated community health/social care trust and her experience of direct payments is that the elderly often don't fancy the prospect of becoming an employer.

It was a general comment and I admitted it was taking the thread off topic, so I said that as I didn't want to move further away from your issue, which is only peripherally about the direct payments system.

I'm aware that direct payments are also available to the physically disabled and I'm sure equal numbers of such service users are daunted by the prospect of taking on an employer's responsibilities.

Regardless of age, no-one knows when someone will die, so a lender's estimate of this is clearly speculative at best.