Historic Aviva lifetime mortgage – could a 2015 drawdown be a separate actionable event?

dunstonh

But then… £4,000 of the initial advance was borrowed at roughly 7% compound interest simply to sit in an instant-access savings account as an emergency fund, despite there already being an undrawn reserve facility.

An emergency fund is money that can be accessed quickly in an emergency. Having the money on a lifetime mortgage and being able to access it isn't something that can be done quickly in an emergency.

And the adviser expressly identified a conventional interest-only mortgage as more cost-effective and said it appeared affordable, but still recommended the lifetime mortgage because my parents did not want monthly repayments.

That seems reasonable. The advisors pointed out a lower-cost option, but with consequences. Your parents didn't want those consequences, so they chose the alternative.

The fact-find contains a formal “Attitude to Risk & Reward and Priority” section, but the questions, resulting profile and agreed joint risk profile are all recorded as “n/a”. There is a separate narrative equity-release risk section, so I’m not claiming risk was never discussed, but the formal assessment appears not to have been used. My mam & dad had no understanding of compound interest.

That is to be expected because attitude to risk and reward is to do with investments, not lending. The UK's largest back-office software provider to advice firms automatically includes its attitude-to-risk section, even where the adviser is not authorised to deal with investments.

There was a solicitor involved. I have the solicitor’s details and some of the conveyancing/release correspondence, but I don’t have the underlying attendance notes or file showing exactly what was discussed with my parents at the time.

Most lifetime mortgages over the last decade or so have seen the solicitors provide significant legal advice on the potential negatives of a lifetime mortgage.

I just wish they’d run it past me at the time, but ultimately it was their decision. I increasingly think it may simply have been a poor financial decision by people who were not especially financially adept, rather than something I’m ever going to be able to prove was mis-sold. A product like this punishes a weak decision very slowly and very heavily

On the other hand, it is their money, and if they've spent that money, then it's enhanced their life, so surely that is a good thing.

The original 2010 advice is now beyond the 15-year longstop. The 2015 release is not. I’d be particularly interested in any precedent, ombudsman/court reasoning, or industry experience on whether reserve drawdowns can be treated as distinct events.

As mentioned already, the 2015 release does not matter. The advice was given in 2010. It was not given in 2015. Your complaint is about the advice, not the product. So it's the date of the advice that matters.

The adviser was recorded as holding CF30 status. Aviva has since stated that CF30 alone would not have been sufficient to establish competence to advise on equity release, but says it has checked its remaining records and is satisfied that the adviser was appropriately qualified and authorised. It has not identified the specific equity-release qualification held.

The FCA register didn't have a role for lifetime mortgages. So you wouldn't expect an individual advisor to have an entry for lifetime mortgages.

I'm not seeing anything in your posts that suggests any wrongdoing. You seem to be doing a lot of digging around and finding nothing.