Mortgage Lending Disgrace - Very Unfair!

hopeofahome

I have been waiting for a Re-Mortgage now from Natwest from what seems months and months on end. (July).

It's what I thought would be a simple re-mortgage. The facts: just 37% LTV, Self-Employed £30k a year over 3 years of accounts, Excellent Experian Credit Report.

My mortgage broker who is also my accountant has been dealing with this since June, we went with Natwest as they were prepared to lend me £147k. 

However Natwest rejected me 7 years ago for a BTL mortgage, in that case I was placing 25% cash deposit, full-time job earning £32k a year, Excellent Credit report. Again after having the initial agreement in principle accepted, their excuse 7 weeks later was (Historic debt of approx £3k - from 10 years prior. So then why accept me in the first place when they had all of this information from Day 1 and what is the point of the 6 years to clear your credit report rule? This is not fair!

 

I was incredibly frustrated and thought this very unfair the first time, I am still awaiting this Re-Mortgage application and really don’t know why they are taking so long, every day waiting is torture as I may be on the brink of losing a family home I have lived in for 42 years since I was a child. if this happens again it will again be for absolutely no good reason with no evidence that I can’t afford the repayments. My situation hasn’t changed since the application was accepted.

My thinking is if they are potentially rejecting people like me earning good money, with Property Equity, Cash, ISA’a, Assets and Investments then who are they accepting? Millionaire’s only? So I feel for first time buyers and every other applicant.

I think they are a National Disgrace and need to be investigated as they are not meeting the fair lending criteria by accepting Applications which they later reject for no good reason. I understand a lender is not required to lend however if they were to be honest and professional when they have all the required information from day 1 then I would at least be able to move onto another lender who would accept me, however because of their incompetence they have left me with no time to execute a back up plan if need be.

kingstreet

NatWest is currently not the place for self-employed cases. In addition, if you have an internal marker for RBS Group debt, you may find you go all through all the self-employed rigmarole to get turned down on the internal marker which doesn't figure until later in the process.

haras_n0sirrah

If they rejected you before for historic debt it seems a strange choice to go back there. I am avoiding Natwest like the plague for anyone self employed as they don't want the business. Stop flogging the horse - it is well and trully dead. Change lender

dunstonh

I think they are a National Disgrace 

One case doesn't make them a national disgrace. 

need to be investigated as they are not meeting the fair lending criteria by accepting Applications which they later reject for no good reason.

They will have a reason and unless you can show the reason is based on flaws then it will be classed as a good reason.

 I understand a lender is not required to lend however if they were to be honest and professional when they have all the required information from day 1 then I would at least be able to move onto another lender who would accept me, however because of their incompetence they have left me with no time to execute a back up plan if need be.

They dont have all the information from day 1.  Bits of it come in later when checks are carried out.

 and what is the point of the 6 years to clear your credit report rule? 

There is no such rule. 

My thinking is if they are potentially rejecting people like me earning good money, with Property Equity, Cash, ISA’a, Assets and Investments then who are they accepting? Millionaire’s only? So I feel for first time buyers and every other applicant.

Different lenders target different markets in different ways. Natwest are not known for being generous with self employed.   A historic bad debt with them doesn't help your cause.

Did you inform your mortgage broker of the historic bad debt?    Is your accountant (as in person) actually your mortgage broker or did you mean accountant (as in firm) the mortgage broker?  The former is a good indication of why being a jack of all trades is not a good idea. If it is the latter then they should know what Natwest are like if they have the experience.  Although if they didn't know of the historic debt issues then it is just one of those things.

ACG

Your mortgage broker is your accountant? Different. 
There is no 6 year credit report rule, a credit report records information for 6 years. Natwest records internally much longer and their general stance is if they have ever had to write off a penny, they will automatically decline you. 

As others have said, Natwest are not really the place for self employed applicants at the minute, they were saying that themselves in July, so I am not sure why your broker would go there in the first place. 

I submitted 2 cases to Natwest last monday, one has been offered today and the other will be offered by CoB tomorrow. Neither are rich, neither are earning as much as you and neither have the LTV that you have (85% LTV for both). It is not that Natwest are bad, it is just that you are not their target customer in the current climate. 

Appreciate you are stressed at the minute and it easy to blame the lender, but the last self employed application I sent to them was probably August time, we had to fill out additional paperwork, provide additional documents and give explanations about the business and where it was at. That case went to offer in 2 weeks which was/is good, but I spoke them before applying and we made sure we had everything from day one. I am not blaming your broker or the lender as I have no idea where the problem lies but I suspect the broker is at least in part to blame even if it was just for choosing the wrong lender in the current climate. 

[Deleted User]

Havent given natwest any self employed cases for about 5 months, no intention of doing so anytime soon.   They have made it very clear that they dont want the business

You stand a very good chance of being rejected by any lender who has internal records of money written off. 

Rather than blame Natwest,  why did your broker suggest them as the best lender for you? 

mowgliisaG

Deleted_User said:

Havent given natwest any self employed cases for about 5 months, no intention of doing so anytime soon.   They have made it very clear that they dont want the business

You stand a very good chance of being rejected by any lender who has internal records of money written off. 

Rather than blame Natwest,  why did your broker suggest them as the best lender for you? 

Why is you have a previous settled debt with the lender? 

mowgliisaG

Sorry what if you have not why 

ChonkyChops

I'm not as angry just yet, but I'm having similar issues. I am however in a more unique case where I am a self-employed contractor (just started in Jan 2020, after working full-time in same profession for over 13 years) and I am paid in USD. Natwest seem to be our only choice right now, so we are just waiting to see what happens. I can't complain about timescales too much, given our unique circumstances, but it's hard to stay positive over a long period of time for sure.

[Deleted User]

mowgliisaG said:

Deleted_User said:

Havent given natwest any self employed cases for about 5 months, no intention of doing so anytime soon.   They have made it very clear that they dont want the business

You stand a very good chance of being rejected by any lender who has internal records of money written off. 

Rather than blame Natwest,  why did your broker suggest them as the best lender for you? 

Why is you have a previous settled debt with the lender? 

There are too many variables to be honest.  If the debt was defaulted on then the lender will always hold that record beyond the 6 years on your credit report, how they look at that is up to their underwriting criteria at the time.  There isn't a hard and fast rule though.  I got a case through with Halifax where the guy had a loan with them that defaulted and was paying them at £5 a month for the next few hundred years. 
Some lenders are more flexible than others but there has got to be a good reason for even going to a lender that has records of bad conduct.  In my case with Halifax it was my only option so it was worth a crack, otherwise i would avoid lenders with internal records like that as it can easily turn the way OP has seen.  

penners324

If your remortgage application being refused will mean you lose your home why not get a retention deal from your current lender? It'll take 5 minutes to set up.