Entitled to any sort of compensation from solicitor?

saajan_12

adrian0508 said:

Deleted_User said:

No, there won't be any compensation in either direction.

You made a mistake in applying for something you didn't qualify for, but no one will seek compensation from you for it. You may need to pay the solicitor for time spent on your case, but no more than what was contractually agreed. Equally, the error won't earn you any compensation from them 

Just learn from the error and structure your next purchase accordingly.

Just to clarify a few things: we have not applied for anything yet, our solicitor has simply failed to mention something until very close to exchange, and has despite being aware of our situation answered our questions as if we would be eligible until now. Apologies if it was not meant so but your final sentence sounds quite patronising to me. I am interested to hear your views further why you think this is okay and how we would learn from this error and structure our next purchase accordingly? Is it not the solicitors job to advise on things such as this? Hence why we questioned things constantly (we are first time buyers and needed advice from our solicitor).

If it helps, here is an example of a written communication we had 4 months ago:

With regards to your Help to Buy ISA, I will need to apply for the bonus at least one week before completion. In order to apply for the bonus I need a copy of the ISA closing letter from your bank, which includes details of your closing balance and account number. The bank may take around a week to produce this letter once you have closed the account and I would look to hold this letter before exchanging contracts in case there were any delays with this. I will keep you updated on the progress of the purchase if would like to close the account nearer to exchange.

This is not our only discussion about the ISA or bonus; the solicitor always knew we were not getting a mortgage, and was advising us on the bonus, I'm just quite angry that they only mention it 4 months later we are not eligible.

No. 
You speak to brokers / H2B advisors / The Money Advice to help check eligibility. The solicitor's job is to deal with the conveyancing and legal side of things eg providing the relevant paperwork if you had a mortgage or H2B. Its not their job to look into your eligibility, just like its not their job to look into your mortgage affordability. They could choose to be more helpful and advise likely timescales because of their experience, but that doesn't create an obligation. 

So they did not fail to mention something in a timely manner, as they had no obligation to in the first place. 

adrian0508

AdrianC said:

adrian0508 said:
If you read what I linked to in my original post it explains all our mortgage problems. The relatively small mortgage we would require is easily affordable to us, but our "unique" situation does not fit into mortgage companies rules and despite our attempts to work around the situation and actually talk to a human capable of looking at the situation properly, they were only ever able to fill in boxes and say "computer says no".

Whether you think a lender should lend to you or not is a separate question from whether any lender is prepared to lend to you. 

I certainly wouldn't be relying on "Well, so long as I can stretch to buy, somebody'll be bound to let me remortgage". That is optimism too far, imho.

I don't tend to get involved over on the mortgage forum, where that thread was - but it sounds like you have input from mortgage brokers who are not optimistic. I would also question whether it's wise for you to be buying shared ownership - you would be liable for all maintenance costs etc, which may well fall outside what is affordable for you - and that's before the risk of repossession. Given your limited incomes and your health situations, I would have thought that a secure HA tenancy may be preferable, but - of course - there is the emotional investment in property ownership to consider.

Not sure you are understanding my replies completely as I never said anything along the lines of "so long as I can stretch to buy, somebody'll be bound to let me remortgage"; we are not relying on this, if we have to pay the loan repayments off to our parents instead so be it, a mortgage would just be preferable for lower repayments.

To break it down, the main reasons we currently don't fit mortgage criteria are: 1) We can't apply for a mortgage based on future income, i.e. benefits income that we would receive once we are moved in as a couple. (we currently live separately and are on different/lower benefits). 2) On a zero hours contract I need to have been working for a year for them to consider that income. 3) We would be entitled to have our rent on the shared ownership part paid by benefits but the mortgage companies still need to assess us as if we are paying that rent.

There are other issues I haven't mentioned however I hope you can see why all these added up made a mortgage impossible even though it "would" still be affordable had they been taking those into account. I fully understand that just because I think someone "should" lend to me doesn't mean they will, doesn't mean I can't discuss our situation and how I personally feel there should be considerations taken into account for fringe cases like ours. 20 years ago if we were applying for a mortgage we could have actually talked to a manager and had an actual conversation about our unique situation and a decision could have been made (whether they would have still said no or not I cannot say, but at least we would have not just felt abandoned), nowadays it's just filling in boxes and seeing what the computer says, well unfortunately a computer can't make human decisions.

We are already on the list for housing association/local council, unfortunately, because they consider us to be in "adequate accommodation" living with parents and not homeless, we have already been on that list for 2 years and only once have we ever seen a property suitable for my partners disability needs and we were something like 150th in the queue for that property when we applied; I doubt that the current coronavirus situation has helped this with more people now homeless and higher priority than us. Not only that but given my partners needs are likely to and do change a lot, we would 100% feel more comfortable owning where we are more in control of the adaptations that we would do.

[Deleted User]

Thrugelmir said:

Densol said:

Id just wait till you complete and you are in and then put in a complaint after and see what they say ? You may get a token offering. 

Which raises the cost of doing business fore everyone. Compensation and the time spent in dealing with frivolous complaints has to be paid for. 

Yeah usually to me !! Last two sets of solicitors I complained to 
1. £500
2. £2900 
If you have a valid complaint its worth complaining and what is valid to one person may seem frivolous to an unknown person on a forum 

steampowered

Densol said:

Id just wait till you complete and you are in and then put in a complaint after and see what they say ? You may get a token offering. 

I'm surprised you suggest this. Did I read correctly from a post elsewhere on these forums that you are a conveyancer?

How would you feel if your clients complained about you without a valid reason, just to see if they get a "token offering?

IMHO it's just a nasty thing to do - as well as wasting everybody's time.