Our Mortgage Providers Wont Let Us See Survey?!?!?

homer_j_3

you pay for them to instruct a survey so you can have the benefit of buying the property. I seriously do not know why anybody would need to see it. If the house has valued up and no retentions have been placed on the mortgage then the survey has served its purpose - to buy the house.

if you want the survey in hope that there is something on there to negotiate further or that you suspected something may have been incorrect with the property then a more indpeth one should have been carried out.

As I said, if the adviser did not fully explain the differences of surveys available and what they were for then its not the lenders fault.

William_H

You've paid 300 odd for the pleasure of having the mortgage provider tell you that they are willing to give you a mortgage based on their estimated value of the property. Which is, of course, the value that you have offered since a property is only worth as much as what someone would pay for it. Therefore, in my opinion, there is nothing for you to see in terms of the report - congratulations on losing £300, yet another fee into your lenders pocket. There is no structural info on the survey - you should have got a more detailed survey if you thought soemthing was suspect structurally. I presume you can still get this, and I would advise it strongly given the age of the house. It is madness not to at least know what you're getting into for such a large purchase - in Canada, no-one, but no-one would buy a property without a full survey - it's part of the contract negotiations.

Your mortgage provider I presume has a downpayment from you, so they don't care if everything falls through - they have your cash. That is simply an extension of the irresponsibility of mortgage providers these days - allowing people to purchase properties which they can't necessarily afford. That's why house prices are still going up. Soon we'll be passing our 100yr mortgages to our offspring like in other countries - since inflation doesn't reflect the price of property, interest rates are still not high enough to stop the ever upwards climb of house prices.

Rant? Yes indeed.

Get a better survey.

WH.

Alan_M_2

ejones999 wrote: »

I don't think that you are!
It is solely for the lender's use.

If you want a survey for yourself then you instruct your own surveyor to do one for you.

My solicitor felt different, pressed his point and was immediately provided with a copy.

Really that speaks for itself.

William_H

Alan_M wrote: »

My solicitor felt different, pressed his point and was immediately provided with a copy.

Really that speaks for itself.

Did you feel that you got value for money when you saw the copy? It raises an interesting point legally - are we getting what we pay for? What about others on this forum? Was the report that you managed to get back from your mortgage provider worth £300?

Maybe a Reclaim Mortgage Fees campaign could be started similar to the Bank Charges on credit cards. Just because the money loaned on a mortgage is so much higher, doesn't mean we should forget about getting fleeced at the outset. Interest rates are already making the provider a fortune. It's called nickel and diming in North America.

nollag2006

Are you solely relying on a valuation report for a house older than 100 years?
The basic valuation report carried out by the mortgage company is for their own internal risk management purposes. The fact that they charge you handsomely for it, is just another way for them to gain profit.

Annoying ? Yes.

Unlawful ? No, not if you agreed to it in your mortgage application

They are probably covering themselves in case you try to rely on anything identified (or missed) in the valuation report.

You should really be commissioning your own more comprehensive survey for a house of this age.

Alan_M_2

Our was a valuation, it's cost £188.

Value for money? Well I suppose the valuer (who was a chartered surveyor) has 4 years of training after a degree to hold that status. Has premises and a vehicle to run as well as crippling professional indemnity insurance premiums.

Value for money is subjective, personally I don't think these fees are excessive. It's usually people who don't run businesses and don't understand the running costs of these businesses that bleat about it.

Do you think the lender should swallow the cost as they'll be earning on the loan? That's naive, they'd just added in somewhere in the figures, 0.001% would cover it on interest, you'd think you're getting a deal when you'd actually be paying more.

There is an underlying feeling in this country that everyone is owed something for nothing, yet all these people believe they should be paid top money for what they do themselves. You can't have it both ways.

Rick62

It sounds like you have not had a survey done. What you have paid for is a valuation for mortgage purposes only. This does not look at the state or condition of the property and does not even assert that it is an 'accurate' value, it is for the sole purpose of satisfying the lender that your property probably provides adequate security for their lending.

As such it has nothing of value to you and the reason the lender will not want to give you a copy is a mortgage valuation does not create any contractural relationship between you and the valuer but if they gave you a copy then you might think that it did.

benood

I think you should press to be supplied with a copy of the report whatever its substance.

As Rick62 says you can't rely upon it but it might give you some useful information, if the lender is really worried about you thinking you can rely upon it then it's a simple matter to provide a header sheet stating that you should not and if you need more security you should undertake a homebuyers report or full structural survey.

epz_2

dont they need to provide you with any information they hold about you under the data protection act, i would guess the survey is your info and house so should be covered.

Conrad

Why on earth should the lender give you a copy?

They want the 'security' assessed to know whether they are able to lend against the security offered, end of.

Its nothing to do with 'being fleeced' - a very childish comment. The lender had every right and indeed a fidicuary duty to check the security is good and sound. Of course you pay for this survice otherwise all sorts of dreamers an no hopers would have valuers attend properties without cost and with no intention of buying the place.

The alternative is lenders do free valuations and we ALL pay via higher ates, how about that then?

If you wanted the place inspected for your own benefit, then pay your own surveyor to attend.

Why dont lenders want you to have access? Because of potential litigation and also because costs would go up for a variety of reasons were the public to conditionally have access to these reports.