Conveyancing and 'gift' nightmare!

sillyhilly

Hi all,

Long time lurker here! We are currently in the process of buying a house, all going well up to now... Apart from our solicitors!

We have had to provide reems of documentation to our solicitors for money laundering checks. As a bit of background, I work as a consultant in anti-money laundering, so I kind of know my stuff. But it's now getting excessive.

The latest issue is that we loaned the in-laws some money last year for their business, and back at the end of 2018/early 2019, they paid it back. It's £5k on a deposit of £35k. The coneyancers are now demanding that we complete a 'gifted deposit' form (£200+VAT). Despite sending them documentation confirming the funds are ours, and confirming that it is not a gift at all, they still want this document and are threatening to tell our mortgage provider, what we believe to be false information that our deposit is a 'gift'.

So my first question is, does this seem unreasonable to you? As it does to us.

Secondly, if they were to notify the mortgage provider, is this likely to cause huge issues?

FTB so a bit jumpy, so apologies (and thanks!) In advance.

AnotherJoe

I can't speak to your answers but I'm mystified as to how filling a form in makes money laundering less likely than showing them documents with the money going in and out of your bank account.

And, IANAL but I wonder if you'd have grounds to sue them if you had that proof and they in effect libelled you with the building soc. especially since, it isn't a gifted deposit is it so you'd be lying if you said it was and they would be inducing you to commit fraud. Nor do I see we why they would charge £200 for it.

I would tellnthem that by asking you to fill this form in, they are inducing you to commit fraud and you wish to make an official complaint. Do that by phone and maybe they will back down (once it's in writing they may be unable to do that)

How did you end up with these solicitors? Unlucky ?recommended by someone?

ACG

Tricky one.
Switch solicitors? The searches can be transferred over.

Thrugelmir

Perhaps it's your agitation which is causing them concern. What's the issue with the in-laws simply signing a gift letter. Any arrangements directly between yourselves need not concern the lender.

amnblog

If you can evidence the funds initially leaving your account to go into the business you have provided an audit trail which the lender would be happy with.

What the Solicitor insist, and their charges on however is a matter for them.

sillyhilly

AnotherJoe wrote: »

I can't speak to your answers but I'm mystified as to how filling a form in makes money laundering less likely than showing them documents with the money going in and out of your bank account.

And, IANAL but I wonder if you'd have grounds to sue them if you had that proof and they in effect libelled you with the building soc. especially since, it isn't a gifted deposit is it so you'd be lying if you said it was and they would be inducing you to commit fraud. Nor do I see we why they would charge £200 for it.

I would tellnthem that by asking you to fill this form in, they are inducing you to commit fraud and you wish to make an official complaint. Do that by phone and maybe they will back down (once it's in writing they may be unable to do that)

How did you end up with these solicitors? Unlucky ?recommended by someone?

Thanks AnotherJoe,

This was our thinking, too. We are adamant that it is not a gift, and we have no reason to say otherwise, so we refuse to fill out the form as a result. If we were to fill it in, we are effectively admitting to it being a gift, which is false in itself.

I left quite a strong email for them this evening, so we'll see what their response is, however I would be more than willing to refer them to the Lawyer Ombudsman.

Funnily enough, they came highly recommended! I won't be naming names (yet! Plus I'm not sure whether they would view this site) but their reviews are excellent, so I'm slightly miffed by their demands, unless it's a few over-zealous paralegals!

sillyhilly

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Perhaps it's your agitation which is causing them concern. What's the issue with the in-laws simply signing a gift letter. Any arrangements directly between yourselves need not concern the lender.

I'm not agitated at all - we've provided them everything they have asked for, and then some! I pre-empted most of this anyway given that I work in anti-money laundering, but this is going far above and beyond what the Regulations require.

The issue is, however, that we haven't told anyone else that the funds are a gift (which they're not!), including the mortgage provider. The mortgage is currently under review, so for us to turn around and change our story midway, or even worse or lawyers do it for us, I worry that that will put the application in jeopardy.

sillyhilly

amnblog wrote: »

If you can evidence the funds initially leaving your account to go into the business you have provided an audit trail which the lender would be happy with.

And we have! And all signs point to the lender being happy with the documentation that we have provided, also. We provided an audit trail of the funds leaving my partners ISA, to our joint account and to their business account... But unfortunately this isn't enough.

boo_star

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Perhaps it's your agitation which is causing them concern. What's the issue with the in-laws simply signing a gift letter. Any arrangements directly between yourselves need not concern the lender.

OP is saying that filling out that form is going to cost £200+VAT from what I can tell.

That's a pretty good reason to not want to fill the form out.

AnotherJoe

sillyhilly wrote: »

Thanks AnotherJoe,

This was our thinking, too. We are adamant that it is not a gift, and we have no reason to say otherwise, so we refuse to fill out the form as a result. If we were to fill it in, we are effectively admitting to it being a gift, which is false in itself.

I left quite a strong email for them this evening, so we'll see what their response is, however I would be more than willing to refer them to the Lawyer Ombudsman.

Funnily enough, they came highly recommended! I won't be naming names (yet! Plus I'm not sure whether they would view this site) but their reviews are excellent, so I'm slightly miffed by their demands, unless it's a few over-zealous paralegals!

I would try by phone tomorrow , speak to someone senior and ask them why they are insisting you fill out a gifted deposit form when the money is not gifted so that would be wrong for you to fill it out, and you have evidence of that "non gift" being your own money, which you've provided.

Reason for phone is to allow them to back down with nothing on the record.

Good luck hope it goes well..

Anxiousannie

The name of this conveyancing company isn't l***l zoom by any chance? I had similar probs wirth my deposit money and they wanted to go to my lender to ask if they were ok with us using our dividends. I swapped conveyancer and went with one I used before and they've been amazing