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Would this count as gifted deposit?

... or does it completely come down to individual lenders?

We saved our deposit of £23k over about 18 months from salary. We have been gifted £10k by my mother which is intended to cover our stamp duty (£8750) and help with fees. 

We received the £10k gift about a week before we made our last deposit into our savings account that covers our deposit, then we added the £10k to that account. 

I'm concerned that we'll get denied from certain lenders for having a gifted deposit even though our entire "house buying funds" equals about £35k and we only need £23k for the actual deposit part. 

I understand different lenders see things differently, just wondered if anyone could offer opinions on how this could be viewed.

Comments

  • MaryNB
    MaryNB Posts: 2,319 Forumite
    1,000 Posts Third Anniversary Name Dropper
    Most lenders accept a gifted deposit as long as she signs a letter saying it's gifted so I wouldn't worry about that. The source of the funds will be checked by your solicitor as part of their own anti money laundering checks and on behalf of the lender.

    If you are clear that the funds are not for the deposit you may still need to prove the source. Your solicitor may need to check the SDLT funds as well since they'll be transferring the SDLT on your behalf and they form part of the process of buying a house (I'm not sure of this though but I wouldn't be surprised if they did). If this is the case the solicitor may require some proof of where your mother got the money e.g. a few month's worth of bank statements showing income going into her account.
  • nicmyles
    nicmyles Posts: 312 Forumite
    Eighth Anniversary 100 Posts Name Dropper
    As Mary says - we had a similar situation and even though in our minds the gifted funds were to cover other things, not just the deposit, in reality the solicitor had to treat it as a gifted deposit in any case, and our family member had to evidence where the money had come from.
  • greensalad
    greensalad Posts: 2,530 Forumite
    Part of the Furniture 1,000 Posts Name Dropper Combo Breaker
    Thanks for the feedback, I thought this might be the case! I'll wait and see what is requested. Annoyingly the funds were given to my mum by my grandmother, and my mum then decided to send them onto us, so I suspect double paperwork!
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