Estate agent asking for mortgage in principal

-taff

You don't give them the paperwork, you tell them to contact your advisor who will confirm affordability.

Doozergirl

samrock wrote: »

Right.. So the AiP gives the EA and Vendor "reassurance" that we are serious buyers meanwhile prying into our financials and feeling more justified to squeeze more money from us. Of course it's our decision if we want to offer more, no argument there, but you have to agree that if we are proven to be ABLE to offer more, the sellers are likely to play their best cards to push for more, this being detrimental to us in the end IF we are keen to get the house.

Thanks for your answers, I think I have the full picture and I am not keen to let in the EA into our financials because it's a double edged sword. We are quite confident that we are in fact serious buyers and we will prove this with an accepted mortgage loan - and that should be the only proof necessary of our "affordability" and sufficient reason to take the house off the market from that point on.

That's your thinking. Perhaps (read actually) they're just trying to do their job and do it with every single buyer, especially now when obtaining a mortgage offer is not easy anymore.

I've sold many houses and never been told what someone's mortgage offer looks like.

Agents work for themselves and want a sale. It doesn't work for them to encourage vendors to push for higher offers when what they need is least resisitance from both sides and compromise. The additional commission to the agency, let alone an individual, for a few thousand is a drop compared to actually getting a sale.

I'd be very careful when you decide not to trust people. You will create barriers for yourselves.

I would not remove a property from the market for someone who insisted that we wait for an actual mortgage offer and refused to show an AIP. Not happening. Firstly, because it gives no confidence in their ability to afford and secondly because people who create barriers are difficult to work with. I have never had a 'successful' transaction with people who don't trust me. I am an open book, so it generally means that people who don't trust end up being untrustworthy themselves - either because they are blatantly dishonest or more often because they end up creating real barriers from stuff that comes from their own minds.

kingstreet

As I've pointed out repeatedly on here over the years, the 1979 Estate Agency Act confers a responsibility on agents to establish a potential buyer has the wherewithal to proceed to unconditional exchange of contracts.

However, the Act is silent on how that is achieved, so agents are largely left to have their own processes for checking buyers and can and often do request copies of AIPs, proof of deposit, demand meeting between advisors and purchasers and so on.

Until legislation is passed which clarifies the way agents are expected to discharge their legal obligations, we are going to continue to get threads like this.

Non-compliance may see your offer not treated as seriously as it might have been.

ReadingTim

Your mortgage won't cover 100% of the purchase, so why don't you share the AIP and keep silent on how large your deposit is?

Secondly, so what if the vendor knows you could have paid more? So what if the EA presses you? You solve the problem by saying the following magic word when invited to up your offer: "No". Hardly complicated is it?!?

hazyjo

-taff wrote: »

You don't give them the paperwork, you tell them to contact your advisor who will confirm affordability.

Yep agree - my mortgage provider just sent something saying that I was good for the price of the house.


Jx

sheff6107

Puzzles me why people apply for a mortgage in principle, get given a certificate and then refuse to show it to an estate agent when they put an offer in on a house. They must frame the certificate and put on the wall or something.

Unless you're putting in a very cheeky offer the amount on AIP won't be above the value of the house anyway. And an agent won't jeopardise the sale by trying to eek out an extra couple of grand out of you. They want to show the vendor that you are a reliable customer and perform due diligence so that they'll say yes can get their commission ASAP.

kingstreet

The DIP Certs I can think of show only what has been applied for, not the maximum available borrowing.

Presumably this is because potential buyers don't want agents to know their limits.

Grenage

An AIP should only be requested if an offer is accepted; we were asked a few times when looking around, and told them to jog on.

AdrianC

sheff6107 wrote: »

Unless you're putting in a very cheeky offer the amount on AIP won't be above the value of the house anyway.

You seem to assume that nobody would ever buy a house that was anything but the absolute maximum they could possibly stretch to.

haf1

the amount on AIP won't be above the value of the house anyway

I concur. The FTB AIP from our bank was pretty much 200% of the mortgage we eventually got. Our (reasonable) offer below asking price was accepted. We did however have a good financial adviser who dealt with any requests from the estate agent.