Mortgage declined due to shared ownership property, anyone else?

shhh90

My husband and I put an offer in on a property in August which was accepted. As far as we were aware, it was freehold and we had our mortgage accepted on this basis.

We've been waiting for ages for the paperwork to be sorted, and it turns out that the reason it's taking so long is due to the fact the property isn't freehold, and is actually a shared ownership property (50% seller, 50% housing association). A bit of a pain as that's not exactly what we were buying, even the estate agent didn't know this was the case.

The paperwork being sorted out was to get the staircasing sorted. So the seller could use our money to then buy himself out of the shared ownership, which would then be transferred to us, meaning at the end, we would own 100% freehold. Weeks and weeks have gone by and we've been told this week that our mortgage has now been declined because the seller does not own 100% of the property. Apparently no other lender will give us the money to buy the property on this basis because it's too risky. Even though at the end of the process, we will own 100% of the property.

Has anyone else had this problem too? Is there anyway to get around this?

This house will be the first home we ever buy together, and it's perfect. We don't want to give up on it, but at the same time, we are unsure whether we are just waiting and then nothing is able to come from it. We've wasted months on this property, and missed the chance of finding somewhere else that would allow us to move in before Christmas.

Would appreciate any advice. Thanks.