Any experience with SAM (Shared Appreciation Mortgages)?

Ozret

MWT said:

shufflemonkey said:

I know that Barclays were also taken to court by Teacher Stern and ended up settling out of court which means Teacher Stern is now taking individual claims from Barclays customers to Barclays who were not part of that priginal case. Hopefully this will help the case that they are currently taking to BOS.

If they are now taking individual Barclays claims that is good news, right after the out of court settlement they were not doing that and the group was closed of course. 

Certainly worth asking them at least, and finding out if there is any time-bar on the claims as I know that was also a concern a few years ago...

If they do take the case it may be relatively costly to pursue as an individual action.

Again thank you for your reply. See my previous post

Ozret

Flugelhorn said:

Ozret said:

MWT said:

Ozret said:

Although we can't prove it, it seems my F-i-L may have been 'targeted' as he celebrated his 60th birthday at the end of May; although it could be a coincidence.

This probably isn't of much use either way, as this product was only available to those over 60, so there is likely to be a strong correlation between reaching the required age and taking a loan in many cases.

Similarly, the lenders typically required the borrower to take independent advice before proceeding...

If they still have their original paperwork look for a witness signature by an IFA for example.

We should also remember that this product offered the borrowers a lump sum that they could not otherwise have accessed at that time so they were potentially attractive products to those who had a need for the cash and no other route to get it...

Thank you again for your input.

At present the F-i-L has no idea what has happened. The whole thing has come about due to the M-i-L going into care and us getting their finances into order. It's possible that the paperwork is in existence at the house but we will only be able to have a look once Mrs Ozret tells her Dad what we've discovered. Clearly is  going to be a difficult conversation to have.

Just say that realise that they must have taken out a loan at some point and need to find the details of it to sort out all the finances - no need to tell him how much is owed.

Mrs Ozret visited her Dad at the beginning of the week. As I originally mentioned he is not, physically, in the best of health. Mentally he is as sharp as a tack. The SAM was discussed, he is now aware that there is a problem but not the numbers involved. 

On a positive note, he still had all the paperwork which we now have

johnincornwall

The court case against BoS (now Lloyds) SAMs by TeacherStern was scheduled to start on Monday just gone, 29th January, unless some agreement was reached at the last minute.  Most people couldn't afford to join this class action but, if an agreement or favourable judgement is reached, Teacher Stern have a retained list of people to contact and hopefully then act for, as they are with Barclays customers.  

shufflemonkey

One of Britain’s biggest high street banks has agreed a payout to settle a case involving “unfair” mortgages – giving hope to thousands of people who have been left owing huge sums.

On the eve of a trial set to last six weeks, Bank of Scotland – part of Lloyds Bank – and a law firm representing 160 current and former customers reached an out-of-court settlement that means the bank will not face a public grilling.

The case involves a Bank of Scotland product called the shared appreciation mortgage (Sam), which has been accused of ruining lives by leaving some people owing 10 or 12 times the sum they originally borrowed.

Teacher Stern, the law firm behind the action, had claimed that Sams were “entirely unfair” products that have left borrowers trapped in their homes, unable to sell up.

The settlement is cloaked in secrecy, with the bank and the law firm only saying they had “agreed a commercial settlement, without any admission of liability”.

Nothing was disclosed about how much money has changed hands, although some of the affected borrowers have been saddled with debts of several hundred thousand pounds – and some owe in excess of £1m.

Individuals who join a claim of this type will sometimes be asked to pay a fee of perhaps £10,000. That may suggest the affected borrowers would not have agreed to forgo their day in court unless they secured a reasonable payout.

MWT

I'm happy for those who were part of the claim group, but as with the previous similar settlement it is unclear how helpful it will be to those not in the group as I presume it is going to be another undisclosed settlement with no admission of liability for those not part of the group...

the_mandarin

@Ozret

I am posting a page and a video on the BBC that may be of some help to you.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-nottinghamshire-67122324

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0hknlq6

rjsdavis

Ozret said:

shufflemonkey said:

I know that Barclays were also taken to court by Teacher Stern and ended up settling out of court which means Teacher Stern is now taking individual claims from Barclays customers to Barclays who were not part of that priginal case. Hopefully this will help the case that they are currently taking to BOS.

Thank you for your  comments. Things have moved on since the weekend. We are aware of the new claim which Mrs Ozret is looking into. It appears there are a large number of people looking to proceed with some sort of action. At present we are considering our options

I've just stumbled across this forum thread by chance. There is some incorrect information detailed above. 

The facts of the matter are that Teacher Stern are the *only* lawyers that have successfully sued and settled with both Barclays and BOS over these SAM mortgages. 

A firm called Hillary Messer attempted it about a decade ago, ran out of funding during the action and their clients were left high and dry. Those clients were then forced into signing NDA's with agreements to never attempt to sue the bank again. Teacher Stern then sued Hillary Messer for malpractice on behalf of these clients, and the HM clients ended up with some small measure of recompense from HM for the failure. They never benefitted from any settlement from the bank. 

TS sued and then settled with Barclays back in 2021, and also sued and then settled with BOS in early 2024. There is extensive coverage of these settlements available to read online. 

TS are presently onboarding new claimants for a new round of claims against both banks. The new Barclays group action has been up and running since approx. Jan/Feb 2024, but is going to close to new entrants in the next week or so (16th October 2024) due to the advancing stage that the action is already beginning to reach. 

TS are also presently onboarding a new cohort of BOS claimants, but this is at a much less advanced stage where no claims have actually been served as yet, and there is no specific rush for any potential claimants to join the group. 

The terms of the two previously settled group claims were agreed under strict terms of secrecy, so no-one other than the lawyers themselves, and the claimants, know the settlement terms. However, one might assume that as these two new groups are getting up and running, that the terms weren't too bad, and were probably an awful lot better than the (upto) 75% of the increase in the value of the property that all of the SAM customers are currently being stung for. 

Important note: The Statute of Limitations clock starts from the date that the SAM mortgage is redeemed. This was a agreed at the prior High Court action. This means that you only have 6 years from the date of mortgage redemption, to be able to make a claim. If you haven't redeemed your SAM mortgage and the SAM mortgage is still live, the SoL clock does not apply.  

rjsdavis

MWT said:

Ozret said:

Having done a bit of research, it seems that there has been a number of successful legal challenges with a number of Solicitors now offering their services. We are going to look into this but it's early days. 

1: The only one I've seen that looks to be legitimate is https://www.teacherstern.com/ but their groups are closed to new members.

2: I'm not particularly hopeful that the pending legal action against BoS will be successful though, but until it is heard I doubt you will find anyone else willing to invest in legal action.

3: At its root, there is no reasonable case for mis-selling and the current court case is based on the claim that the terms are 'unfair', but the banks can also reasonably counter that the terms were fair in the context of foreseeable propriety value growth at the time and they were set as they were to balance the risk that there might not be enough growth in value to cover both the loan and reasonable interest. 

4: Either way, the case against BoS is the one they are investing time in at the moment, not Barclays, and until there is a verdict I would be very distrustful of anyone claiming they will take action for you...

5: Both banks do have a hardship fund for those who are heavily impacted by these loans and it may be worth looking into that, but pay attention to the terms that go with accepting any payment from the fund...   

1: Wrong. At the time you wrote this, the new Barclays group was just starting up. BOS has now also opened up as of April/May 2024. 

2: Wrong. Teacher Stern have already successfully settled with Barclays in 2021. Teacher Stern have also settled with BOS in early 2024. 

3: Wrong. The Consumer Credit Act is at the heart of these actions, and the CCA also empowers courts to retrospectively adjust, quosh, amend and re-write any inherently unfair contract. This is most likely the reason why neither Barclays nor BOS wanted either claim to be heard in the High Court - indeed BOS capitulated on the steps of the High Court the evening before the HC action was due to commence. It would not be possible for a SAM product to come to market today for very obvious reasons. This is why the CCA is so very powerful for addressing the wrongs of the unregulated, cowboy mortgage market of the 80's and 90's. 

4: Wrong. Both have been settled. 

5: Wrong. Only Barclays have a hardship fund. This isn't worth a damn though. 

I can't help but wonder whether you work for one of the two banks? 

SeaBee41

We discovered the massive profit made to Barclays from a SAM on my parents house when my mum died. 740% was the profit! We complained to Barclays and subsequently the Ombudsman citing the unfairness of the contract rather than the contract itself. Although we did refer to the misleading marketing of the product (all branding and marketing was Barclays Bank unless you read the very small print), the small predicted increases in house value - which wouldn't have made this an attractive product to sell from the bank's perspective and the unusual step of setting up a separate company within Barclays group to "own" the mortgages - Barclays SAMS as if Barclays already knew the liability impact of these products and the benefit this would bring to the bank in any subsequent complaint being able to declare separation. These products were only made available from a pool of £100M but why was such a profitable product dropped? All court cases have either ran out of money or Barclays/BoS have settled days before court preventing any court exposure of this destructive product to the bank's reputation. With regard to the hardship fund it wasn't really a fund but a further investment. The £12,000 they "lent" my mother to upgrade her house so she could stay in it was more than paid for by the further £30,000 interest the bank made keeping the SAM agreement going for another 3 years. I will not do business with Barclays in fact when I was self employed under my terms and conditions I would not work with a client that banked with them. A few clients actually changed banks after they asked me why I would not work with them and told them our SAM story....