remortgage with a charge on the house??

LJW_2

Hi Mighty Mouse, great detective work sounds quite promising.

My OH has contacted the solicitors for the bank and they say that they first contacted him in November 2007. They didn't know if the bank had tried previous to this and said they didn't have a witness statement (does that make sense?) I think they did and this would have been around Jan 2007 ish!

Do you think we could contact the bank direct to see if any letters were sent?

mightymouse

Hi LJW

If the solicitors are saying they did not contact you until November 07 and cannot support any previous contact (let them do the work) then this evidence of contact will be missing from all documents previously sent to you and the Court.

Do you have a bundle of papers sent to you by the Solicitors as being evidence upon which they relied when they went to Court.

Do not contact anyone further at this stage.

LJW_2

Hi again, no we didnt get a bundle from them. Also my OH only moved in with me when we got married in July 06 it was only then he was put on the electoral role where I presume they found him. Before then he did have some post sent to mine as a co address but only that.

How would I find if the bank have proof of earlier letters? Should he ring the courts and ask for copies of theirs?

mightymouse

Hi LJW

The Mortgage Code, which no longer exists, came into effect for lenders on 1 July 1997 and it is this document where Lenders state they they will abide by the Council of Mortgage Lenders.

From 11 February 2000, lenders who are members of the CML have agreed voluntarily that they will not pursue a shortfall debt following a mortgage possession if they have not managed to contact the borrower within a period of six years from that date.

It is this statement that will be the deciding factor.

Ideally an articulate property solicitor should be instructed to obtain the paperwork and consider whether there are sufficent grounds to have the origional Judgment set aside which will allow you to file a Complaint to the Financial Ombudsman to determine whether the Lender was acting outside the agreement.

The Solicitor may want to obtain the opinion of Council regarding your prospects.

The Financial Ombudsman would entertain a claim regarding the Banks activity under whichever rules regulate the repossession.(FOS comments not mine).

It seems the best way forward would be to have a word with your Local Solicitors and find one who is experienced in these matters and arrange for a free Interview to explore your situation further.

Also you need copy Documents from the Lenders Solicitors without giving any information to them but maybe your Solicitor can do that for you.

At this stage I do not want to involve you in a great deal of cost so you can do it yourself with help from this forum.

I realise this is not easy and this is a forum reply but my opinion says it might be possible to do this and without spending a lot of money.

LJW_2

Thanks Mighty Mouse, I will ask OH to get the copy documents. As it is back in court in June should we still complete our letters of argument against a charge and twin track it just in case getting copy paperwork takes a while?

mightymouse

Hi LJW

Contact the Court and ask them if they can help with documents and to send you whatever they can relating to the origional Claim as the origional paperwork was never received by you.

Also ask the Court to send you forms to complete to set the Judgment aside.

Write a simple letter to the Solicitors asking for copies of the information that they sent to court.

Contact your local Legal Services Commission to see if they can help re advice and costs.