I am losing my will to live!

Briggany

New poster here, have been on here before to put my mind at rest when hitting hurdles with my first ever mortgage. But now it's got to the point that I need to vent and I need someone to tell me I am not losing my mind.

Rewind to April 2019. My girlfriend finds a house in her parents village (technically a small hamlet) that is perfect for us, nice and big for what it is, really affordable in a quiet part of the country with nothing but farms and fields for miles around. We both want to live in the country so it was perfect.

We put in our offer and its accepted. We apply for a mortgage through my company (we manage a large proportion of the UK's financial advisers so get company perks) and to our amazement it was accepted, we pass credit checks and underwriting. Then it gets to the survey and unfortunately it gets valued at £0 due to non standard construction and some other issues. The house is over 200 years old and had an extension done in the 60's.

We drop our interest as we can't afford to pay cash for it and get work done. Fast forward to August and the estate agents have good news out of the blue. A builder they work with is going to buy it for cash, do all the required works and update things, then sell it to us for the same price and asked if we were still interested. Brilliant, we are back on and we know we can get a mortgage now so it's just a waiting game.

Fast forward to the end of November, the builder is done, the house is completely up to regulation and has new shiney everything in it and we now instruct our solicitors to pick the case back up and sign all the relevant documents to proceed. All we need is the mortgage.... this is where it gets really tough to bare.

There are a few things that need to be considered:
- Girlfriend just switched to a new job in the civil service
- The builder has owner the house for less than six month
-The girlfriend owns a property already and wants to let it out
- She has agreed consent to let on her residential mortgage.
- Builder has been patient but patience is understandably running out as this has dragged since the end of November
- All money is in place.

Some of these are limiting factors in which providers we can go with.

We went with the post office, they accept us but then turn around and say we need to up the deposit from 5% to 10% due to my partner owning another property.

We then decided to up our deposit to 10% but go with my partners current provider (Natwest) only to again get through and then be told "Sorry the 6 month rule means we can't lend to you".

Our mortgage Adviser then went back to the post office on the original acceptance and said we now have 10%... they again say yes that's fine only for us to then be told "Sorry... 6 month rule".

I spend a few nights staying up until 3/4AM going through hundreds of providers lending criteria to find a few that would lend on our circumstances, We find Barclays, I tell our adviser and she goes and call them and amazingly they say that they can lend us the 90% LTV under our very specific circumstances stated above.

We get accepted straight away, we then wait for the valuation and again it comes back in our favour, we then wait for underwriting and the excitement builds as they say "Yes you have passed" and we finally receive our Mortgage offer! The solicitors are over the moon as they have been working our file for seven to 8 months with it being on hold at various points.

Two days ago we received the offer in the post and our mortgage adviser notices that one of the conditions states we need to sell my partners house in order to complete. We are baffled as all the forms and telephone conversations are based on it being consent to let and Barclays account manager even said that with consent to let this is all fine. She says not to worry she will get it removed and calls barclays.

Yesterday we were punched in the stomach and had the wind removed from our sails by Barclays saying that with consent to let they would require 20% deposit and not 10%. Or we get my partners mortgage changed to a Buy to Let to the tune off £5k.So the choice is pay £5k to change the mortgage or £10k to up the deposit, money that we simply cannot get hold of at short notice. Both my partner and I have been gifted money from family members as they would rather our inheritance is used in their life time and not after they have left this earth. We have also saved about £10k ourselves over the last year.

It's now been raised as an urgent complaint with the weight of my company behind it as Barclays have failed in their due diligence and offered us a mortgage completely missing the Consent to let information on all the forms. We are hoping to god that they make an exception as obviously things have proceeded with the solicitors and the builder. Barclays are incredibly apologetic that they have made this monumental mistake and its 50/50 if they will or won't lend on the criteria that we have been told we were getting the mortgage on.

I can easily afford the mortgage of both this house and my partners on my Salary alone,I just couldn't borrow enough to get it in just my name.

I just amazes me how I am ready to get on the property ladder, I have nearly £40k to give to someone and then spend the rest of my life paying back a large some of money, essentially giving the banks free money. And it's proving to be near impossible to get a mortgage. I have worked so hard all my life, and I have been lucky enough to get a good job and have a long career at the age of 30. Is the world against me?

Cscott139

There are quite a few lenders that don't have the 6 month rule on purchases. Barclays do have restrictions on let to buy and your broker should have been aware of this before applying but again there are other lenders you can approach.


I take it you have budgeted for the higher stamp duty on this new purchase with your partner already owning another property?

jacsll55

I truly understand your predicament. I am currently overcome one very similar to yours, both my wife and myself work full time and have been in work/self employment for very very long time now, never claimed a penny as benefits expect for the normal child benefit.

We pay in a good amount about towards NI and PAYE systems/ work place pensions. Good clean credit file. Yet the way banks treat us is just baffling.

We achieved our goal by just not giving into all these tactics and punches of the "credit system" of this Country. We did not give up cos few banks and lenders told us NO.

Credit is a scam, but we are put in a position to rely on it for everything as the living wage or minimum wage is not fit for purpose.

All I can say is DON'T GIVE UP and you will get there.
Let the world be against you, yet if you have hope and determination you can get there with patience and perseverance.

We gave up holidays for the last 5 years and much more! we have just booked our first 3 weeks holiday in summer this year!

I wish you all luck to get on the property ladder.

Briggany

Yes we have budgeted for the extra Stamp duty.

It's just a cluster of issues.

We found lenders that didn't take into account the 6 month rule, they were then limited by the fact my partner had just switched jobs and most needed more than 6 months in their current role. And then her having a house limited it further due to the 10% requirement so we managed to get the extra 10%.

The broker was aware of this and she told them at every step of the way, but Barclays kept saying yes each time, even when she double checked. So we continued based on the information we were told by Barclays only for them to suddenly realise it after they had offered us the mortgage!

ACG

Your mortgage broker needs sacking.
It almost looks like they are making applications based on who is cheapest rather than who will accept you.

As an example in November we had a customer who was buying a house that a developer had recently bought, I knew that could be an issue so I called up some lenders and Natwest stance was that they would do it if the builder "is a large national developer". As it happens our developer had done 20 developments in 3 counties so I checked if that fit criteria as it is borderline national. As it happens they accepted it. I know their criteria because I checked it and we placed the case with them.

A local builder would never in a million years going to be accepted.

Your broker has caused you far more headaches and stress than necessary when they could have done what you did and reviewed criteria or called their account managers and run the case by them.

I feel for you as a lot of what you have gone through could have been avoided.

Briggany

Kinda stuck between a rock and hard place with the adviser. She is the companies mortgage adviser for staff, she has been working her socks off to get this through and she says that she has never dealt with one that's so complicated before. She called every lender that the company uses, but at the same time she has known all these circumstances since the beginning and its only because I have been so proactive in doing my research that she realised the six month rule was a thing!

My only fear is now we have been rejected for 3 mortgagges (not on credit or affordability, but criteria) and we are sat on the edge of losing the 4th right at the last hurdle because the bank didn't do their underwriting properly. Its looking unlikely that they would make an exception and go against policy.

It's frustrating as by the time this is all done I reckon the 6 month rule will simply not be a factor. But that may be a month to far for the builder to wait as he has already said that they will renovate it further and up the value if we are unable to get a mortgage.

MaxiRobriguez

I agree with others, sack your broker and try again with a different one in order to avoid waiting another six months.

ACG

Less speed more haste as the my gran used to say.
She is running around like a headless chicken (your broker, not my gran) and what she is doing is quite scary and worrying.

She is clearly not ready to be unsupervised. People make mistakes, after 8 years I probably still make them. But what she is doing is making the same kind of mistakes on the same application. She is rushing and she needs to put the groundwork in before doing credit checks.

I am not sure if you have lost money on valuation fees, if you have I would be making a complaint to get those back.

All she needs to do is spend the hour she is wasting on pointless applications and ring up lenders instead. She would get a lot further. I have no idea what Barclays will do, but hopefully she is looking for a plan B just in case.

haras_nosirrah

Doesn't sound like a free broker is much of a perk on a complicated case
Your circumstances are not standard. Run this past another broker who has the time to really devote to your case.

I agree with the others - a lot of this could have been avoided

[Deleted User]

If she has just switched to a new job in civil service has her employer remained the same? If so then plenty lenders will lend on this as a job change rather than a new job

The 6 month rule is ignored by some very good lenders and is flexible with others. I also got one through Natwest not too long ago. Its mainly about getting the support of the account manager for these types of cases

Retained property with a 10% deposit isnt that difficult either

Overall, bringing it all together obviously limits the choices but it shouldnt be this hard to do.

The minute you had to suggest a lender to your broker that she hadnt considered should have been the last straw.

Go on the quiet and get a 2nd opinion from an experienced broker. If your first broker comes through then fine, if the 2nd one sorts it then fine.

Briggany

I would like to thank you all for your replies, I am a pragmatic person and so I try to explore every avenue so I can know what to expect. I even started calling other mortgage brokers.

I have just received a call and confirmation email from the my companies broker that Barclays have agreed to the offer they have made, and removed the condition that my partners property be paid off. They will now offer us on condition of consent to let and loan us the full 90% ltv.

This last few month has been an emotional rollercoaster, and the last week especially has been massive highs followed by the body blow off the error. It would appear that things have balanced out. I won't be counting my chickens until we have completed but this puts us back on track to our dream home.