Mortgage broker - ask me anything

Aj2000

Hi,
Not quite sure what we can/can't do with our mortgage!  
My partner's mortgage is up for renewal end of November.  He currently has the mortgage with his brother - this has been on a 5 year fixed rate, so you can imagine rates are massively higher now!
The 'spanner' is we have started the process to remove his brother from the mortgage and add me.  We've had the initial affordability check (all fine), which was a 4 week wait for the appointment, and now the 'next' appointment they can do is 3rd Jan 2023 for actual checking to get approved to have a mortgage.
This is with NatWest, who the mortgage is currently with.
My question is, between Nov-Jan, do we stick with the variable rate NatWest will automatically move us onto.  Or do we look to fix a 3/5 year rate in now?
Thanks
 

celly5460

K_S said:

celly5460 said:

Good Morning! I was wondering if there are any brokers who have experience with joint applications where one applicant is on a spouse visa. I would appreciate guidance as to which lenders are happy to consider such applicants with a 5-10% . I am aware that Nationwide have recently changed their requirements to allow applicants without indefinite leave so I will go into a branch to find out more. If there are any others, I'd be grateful if you could share and would be happy to receive a message from brokers on this. 

@celly5460 Assuming that one half has a UK/Irish passport or ILR/settled status, and the other is on a spouse visa, the options available at 90/95% LTV will vary depending on the income level, length of UK residence, how thin their credit report is, whether their income needs to be factored in, the expiry date on the BRP, whether you need to maximise borrowing, kind of property, whether you own any other properties anywhere in the world, etc.

Unless there's a reason you want to do the legwork yourself, this is definitely one for a broker. If it's a fee that's putting you off there are plenty of fee-free brokers listed in the MSE guide here https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/mortgages/best-mortgages-cashback/#step3

Thank you K_S ! We are definitely happy to pay a broker and would be happy to take recommendations of ones who have dealt with similar scenarios. I'll also check out that link. Thanks again. Settled partner earns £50k on a permanent contract whilst the other contracts. The current contract is £400 per day for 8 months with payslips to prove continue employment on similar rate for the past 2 years. BRP expires in April 2024 and the plan is to apply for ILR then. The house is a semi and is on offer for £450k. We have a 10% deposit plus stamp duty to pay as the settled partner purchased a property 6 years ago.   

K_S

Alzum said:

Good morning all, my 5 year fix is ending in February. Thinking of moving next year, so I'm wondering what's best, get a discounted rate with no ERC then fix when we move, or fix in February and figure the rest out when we need a bigger mortgage?
I'm not sure what the deal is when you have a fixed and then want to increase the mortgage. Do you just pay off the existing one with the ERC and get a new mortgage?
Thanks in advance.

@alzum No-ERC variable vs fixed - will depend on the details, specifically whether you will need to access the whole of market when you move or you would be fine doing mortgage porting and being limited to your current lender.

Of course you can always pay the ERC and then look at the whole market but that's likely to be sub-optimal if you already know that you are going to move within the next year.

K_S

Aj2000 said:

Hi,
Not quite sure what we can/can't do with our mortgage!  
My partner's mortgage is up for renewal end of November.  He currently has the mortgage with his brother - this has been on a 5 year fixed rate, so you can imagine rates are massively higher now!
The 'spanner' is we have started the process to remove his brother from the mortgage and add me.  We've had the initial affordability check (all fine), which was a 4 week wait for the appointment, and now the 'next' appointment they can do is 3rd Jan 2023 for actual checking to get approved to have a mortgage.
This is with NatWest, who the mortgage is currently with.
My question is, between Nov-Jan, do we stick with the variable rate NatWest will automatically move us onto.  Or do we look to fix a 3/5 year rate in now?
Thanks
 

@aj2000 If your NatWest fix is up on 30 November, is there any reason you're sticking to NatWest?

You could always do a re-mortgage (move to a new lender) with a transfer of equity to the best available rate on the market currently.

If you intend to stick to NatWest, then in your place, unless I was 100% certain that NatWest will process the change, I would leave it on a variable rate as otherwise if on 3rd Jan NatWest turn around and say that they can't add you to the mortgage then you're stuck with them unless you're willing to pay the ERC and move lender. Currently there's not a huge difference between NatWest SVR (5.49%) and fixed rates (5% upwards) so you won't be paying too much more (if anything) while on SVR.

HWBY

I'd appreciate someone who's in-the-know sharing their opinion on what's happened to me and my wife. I've posted about parts of it before elsewhere.

We had an offer accepted for £330k, and applied for an 85% LTV mortgage, so £285.5k. A month later the bank emailed us with our offer, but for £231k, the mortgage illustration stating a house value of £281.5k. After several phone calls, it transpired that our broker had filled in a form ('Focus 360'(?)) incorrectly, saying we declared a house value of £330k but we were buying it for £280.5k and wanted an 85% LTV mortgage on the 'purchase' amount - £231k.

The bank and broker told us that was the firm valuation figure, and it wasn't going to change. Our broker refused (and refuses) to acknowledge their error. The bank was quite rude ("you may not like the valuation, sir, but it is correct and final").

Our application went through again, but it's not clear what happened. The bank told us that they couldn't offer anything else because the house already had a mortgage offer in place. Our broker referred to it as an appeal.

Three weeks later, we get through another mortgage offer - the bank accepts a revised valuation of £330k, but were still only offering a £231k mortgage loan. I don't know how this got through, as we've only provided evidence of funds for a £49.5k deposit. More calls, apparently the underwriter signed off on our application after the house value had been amended, but before the rest of it was updated.

Received another email today from our broker saying that everything has been updated and approved, and we'll receive the correct offer tomorrow. I confirmed all the figures with him, he says they're definitely right this time.

So... does anyone know what on earth happened here? Any recourse we have? We've already filed a complaint with the broker, but I think we need to complain to the bank too. We've had two completely incorrect offers issued before getting the right one, and we submitted everything we were asked to correctly! The application was originally made on 6th October, and the first (incorrect) offer made on the 28th October, so fixing this has taken me running round like a blue-arsed fly for just shy of three weeks.

K_S

@hwby 'Focus360' is just the Natwest broker portal which we use to submit applications. 

The NatWest application form asks for 'Property Value' and 'Purchase Price'. In most cases they're one and the same. In some cases (like concessionary purchases, etc. they might not be). As you mention in your post, the issue appears to have stemmed from the broker (or more likely a back-office admin person if it's a large volume broker firm) erroneously inputing a lower figure for PP and the bank then valuing it at the PP which would be expected. The application form also asks for the exact loan size so that would also have to have been input as 231k at the application stage.

Assuming you get the correct offer finally at the rate that you initially applied for, and haven't been out of pocket or incurred extra costs due to this error and delays, now that you have formally complained you'll probably be offered a token compensation for the inconvenience and stress, most likely from the broker firm.

HWBY

K_S said:

@hwby 'Focus360' is just the Natwest broker portal which we use to submit applications. 

The NatWest application form asks for 'Property Value' and 'Purchase Price'. In most cases they're one and the same. In some cases (like concessionary purchases, etc. they might not be). As you mention in your post, the issue appears to have stemmed from the broker (or more likely a back-office admin person if it's a large volume broker firm) erroneously inputing a lower figure for PP and the bank then valuing it at the PP which would be expected. The application form also asks for the exact loan size so that would also have to have been input as 231k at the application stage.

Assuming you get the correct offer finally at the rate that you initially applied for, and haven't been out of pocket or incurred extra costs due to this error and delays, now that you have formally complained you'll probably be offered a token compensation for the inconvenience and stress, most likely from the broker firm.

Thanks for the explanation - it confirms pretty much what I was suspecting had happened. We're with L&C, so yes, likely some back office drone making a mistake in the midst of probably a lot of applications.

We're FTBs and renting, I told our solicitor to put a pause on doing any further work until this was sorted, since both broker and bank were telling us the initial valuation was correct and final. So it could be argued we've been delayed three weeks incurring rent payments, but I'll see what L&C say once the complaint process updates.

flyingv

Hello, hoping for a bit of advice please.

Can anyone help with underwriting times for Cambridge Building Society?  Broker submitted application on 8th November, after previous two lenders pulled their rates/changed their lending criteria at the last minute.  I'm panicking slightly as we had our offer accepted on 11th August!  Thank you in advance.

vlou

Hello, nearing the point of failure/completion and in desperate need of some help.

I have a mortgage offer with Halifax that we applied for directly (first mistake). This offer is due to expire on the 30th November, I'm purchasing a new build flat and building control were meant to sign off on the property but this has now been delayed until 21st November. We've been told that it can take 7 - 10 days for the warranty paperwork to come through which the seller has said is a requirement to complete.

We could potentially be looking at completing within 24 hours of the mortgage agreement expiring, hopefully the correct side of the deadline. What happens if we get all the required paperwork and our solicitor gets this to Halifax on the 29th/30th? Do Halifax need to complete their part of the exchange prior to the 30th or is that the deadline for us getting it to them.

Is there anything that can be done, we've requested an extension through our mortgage advisor numerous times and have been told it's not feasible and we've have to refresh to the current interest rate.. The property is a new build and we were sold a "green homes" mortgage with a 6 month expiry date instead of a "new homes" product, we've raised a complaint to find out why we weren't told about the new homes mortgage despite purchasing a new build but unfortunately won't have a response until the 5th. This complaint was raised 7+ weeks ago and the entire process has been an ordeal.

What should our next plan of action be and is my current mortgage offer a lost cause. At this point I don't even need to move into the property, is there any way to complete with a deferred move in date that would satisfy the seller and lender.

To anyone about to start the process, use a broker. We've have got a better deal and the correct product had we have done so.

cupcake43

Can I ask what the role of a mortgage broker is?

I'm just going through a re-mortgage and have used a recommended broker from the MSE site and I'm not sure what if any benefit they are providing. 

I feel like I've done all the heavy lifting and having to call the lending bank directly to clear things up and have had to deal with the lender appointed solicitor directly myself.

I had assumed from previous experience the mortgage broker should be doing this type of thing?