Broker or go it alone

rev_henry

I'm applying for a FTB mortgage with my wife, had an offer accepted on a house we like this morning. :j

I've spoken to a broker who has picked for us a pretty good deal with the post office, fairly similar to what I've seen on the best buy tables etc. He says we're towards the upper limit of the post office affordability business but OK.

Now my conundrum is this.
Do I go with the broker or do I go it alone on a marginally better deal? I've seen one with the post office direct and one with HSBC. Both are marginal, but about £200 cheaper over a year. But I've no idea how I would fit with the affordability criteria with either, hence why I went to a broker.
The only way of getting some idea seems to be each lenders affordability calculator on their websites but even that isn't very accurate.

dimbo61

So many things to consider, age, job, deposit, LTV, credit score, etc.
Will you be using a solicitor, surveyor, ? So why not a broker !

amnblog

Your post makes is clear you do not really know what you are doing if you manage things yourself - why would choose to given that?

MortgageMamma

Use the broker. And avoid using the broker from the estate agents you are buying with. Make sure whichever broker you choose is whole of market. HSBC I think only lend through select brokers but I don't know which ones - so you could potentially get advice on the HSBC as well. As a FTB don't go it alone, good advice now will set you up for life. A good adviser educates their clients along the way.

edinburgher

Use the broker. Point out the fact that you have found what you think is a marginally better deal and ask them to see whether they can beat it. Every times where we have used a broker, I was convinced that I had found the best deal going and every time they have been able to better what I found by myself or explain why a previously highlighted rate was, in fact, better for my circumstances :beer:

rev_henry

Thanks everyone. The broker is L&C, so possibly not quite the same quality of advice as those of you who are brokers yourselves? But still FAR better than nothing.

The two other deals I've seen claim to be direct only deals, which would suggest the only way of using a broker to access them is by paying said broker, which I don't want to do.
I think I'll stick to the broker as you all say.

KayTM

Most people, especially brokers, suggest that you should use a broker. Fair enough - but make sure you have a good one.

Being inexperienced at buying property, we also went down that route initially. But our broker (part of a nationwide chain) was useless. He didn't listen to what we wanted, eg in terms of LTV, but went after deals that sounded better on paper. (Yes, we know we can get a better rate if we put down a bigger deposit, but if we do use that money for the deposit we won't be able to afford to do X,Y, Z which we need to do.)

Then he arranged a DIP, which sounded great but there was no substance to it. In other words, we thought that we'd be able to borrow £x on the strength of it but when we actually applied for a loan of that amount, we were told "no" because our circumstances didn't tick the lender's boxes.

Anyone can get a DIP online in five minutes, it's just a case of typing in a few figures. It bears no relation to what a lender might actually be prepared to lend you personally.

The rejection of our first mortgage application happened well into the purchase process. We offered for a house on the basis of the DIP and immediately asked the broker to go ahead with the full application. Then we heard nothing for three weeks. We assumed all was well. But he'd gone on holiday and hadn't even applied!

We gave up in frustration and decided to go it alone. We first applied to the lender that the broker had suggested and they turned us down mostly because of our age (over 50) which meant we'd need a shorter mortgage than usual. We then applied to HSBC and got our mortgage loan agreed soon after. It was quite a gruelling experience - they wanted to know every detail of our finances past, present, and future. Chances are, they'd have wanted that info anyway whether or not we had a broker.

There's a huge amount of info here on MSE. We used their tables to search for the best deals. Then we read all the relevant articles. If we were unsure of anything, I asked on this forum. We were glad to be in control of our own finances and take the helm. After all, no one understands what we need/want/can afford better than we do. It was quite a relief to be able to go direct rather than through an intermediary who seemed to be slowing up the process and deciding what he thought we should have without regard for what we said we wanted (especially in terms of how much deposit to put down).

I'm sure some brokers do a good job but I wouldn't even consider using one again. One bad apple and all that...