Estate agency forcing me to see their broker

dannim12345

I got told I had to have a meeting with the in-house broker even though I had my own. I pretend he was a family friend too...

The in-house guy decided the best mortgage was the same one my broker suggested (Halifax) but they wanted £300 to process it and my broker didn't charge. I wasn't pushed anymore.

Although I didn't have an AIP at the time I arranged the viewing, maybe if I did they wouldn't have pushed? I had it by the time I had the meeting with the in-house broker though.

orionmoo

We reluctantly saw our EA's broker, even though we had a mortgage in principle from Halifax. She was pretty useless. All she did was put our income details into her computer application, checked a box that said we wanted a 2 year fixed, and pointed at the top result (supposedly the cheapest) and said "I recommend you go with this".

No looking in to whether it was actually suitable. For instance after the fixed deal ended the rate went sky high. Okay maybe we will switch as soon as our Halifax deal is up but who knows. It also didn't allow overpayments which we wanted.

They just go with what they can make more money off. They get commission from the banks and expect you to pay her a fee too. There was no difference between what she did, and using a comparison site or MSE to find mortgage deals and compare that way.

This was with estate agent Haart, an "independent" business called Just Mortgages. So independent that they happened to share an office. Didn't even email on the rates to us to compare to our Halifax deal.

These estate agents are pesky slimey !!!!!!s. Best to have as little to do with them if possible...

kingstreet

FWIW The EA Act is silent on how it is achieved, but it tasks the Agent with ensuring the buyer is able to proceed quickly to unconditional exchange of contracts.

Sadly, this has been interpreted by some national chains of estate agents as "coerce every buyer to sit in front of our limited-panel mortgage advisor in the hope the buyer will be so scared they might lose the property, they'll buy our poor quality mortgage service, conveyancing, tied insurance and survey services."

Some of them appear to be making this work, judging from their profit announcements. That suggests new legislation is needed, IMHO.

boat1110

Had the same trouble with Haart estate agents in Manningtree - they will not put offer forward until I see their mortgage advisor which is against the law. Warning do not use them!

cloo

Barnard Marcus are the worst! We nearly bought a house through them and they blatantly kept showing it to loads of other people after the vendor agreed to sell to us, and harassed us on the phone all the time saying they'd get a cash buyer and so on. Kind of glad it feel through with them and the house got sold in the end by a second agent who was on it.