Not the most professional way to start a post. But in reality you might be surprised at what can happen with a mortgage application.
Argue is probably not quite the right word. Neither is fight, but both would be in the ballpark. Argue felt a little more PC.
We argue with Lenders
Earlier this year we received a Mortgage offer. In there was a “special condition”. A special condition is something over and above the normal things. Normal things would be pay the mortgage on time, not let the property out etc, the things that are the same for everyone.
A special condition is something specifically for that application. In this case it was to “repair subsidence”. The problem is that there was no subsidence. This in itself is fine, however the problem is that when subsidence is mentioned it can cause a problem with Buildings insurance.
As there was no subsidence, I wanted that condition removing. The lender refused. I then asked if we could change the word “subsidence” to “movement” – they refused.
This is where the argument starts.
There was no subsidence – we had a structural report confirming it.
There was a rotted wooden beam on the first floor which had caused some cracks in the wall. You would think the lender would think “oh yes, sorry, lets correct that.” But they did not do that.
I asked to speak to a manager, they referred it off… 12 days I spent chasing for a response. On the 13th day, I threw the proverbial grenade.
Can I have your complaints email address please?
All of a sudden, I was put on hold. I was then told I can email the team manager.
Nope. I have been told its been sent to the manager and nothing has happened. I want to make a complaint. Can I have the complaints email address please?
Put on hold again….
The operations manager will call you in 2 minutes.
Funnily enough, she already knew about the case. Apparently everyone in the office knew about me! I cant decide if that is a good thing or not. But it shows that I care enough to fight for our customers I think.
The outcome
I had a good conversation with the operations manager. She could see my argument, she could also understand that I had been quite patient up until this point – all good, but that does not get what we want.
She went off and spoke to the underwriting manager. The following day they had issued the new offer with the altered wording.
As happy as I am at the outcome, it took 2 weeks longer than it should have. It took the threat of a complaint and some heated discussions. It should never have happened in the first place. But the main thing is that we we got there.
We argue with Estate Agents
This is another case, which was going on at the same time as the above case.
A customer called us to say something had cropped up at the legals stage that he was not happy about. We talked it through and decided on a plan forward. He tried to renegotiate and after a week they had made some head way.
The problem was that the estate agents had said they want to keep the purchase price the same but give the client the cashback on completion.
Now, the problem here is that if the lender found out it would create further problems as they would want to alter the purchase price down, in line with the cashback. Best to just amend the offer with the lender directly now to avoid problems down the line. It also means the client is not relying on a vendor and estate agent to give him the money. Not mentioning something they probably should have is not exactly filling us with trust.
I told the client to do it the correct way. Agents told him that its this way or no way.
We called the agents, told them that what they wanted to do was not possible without withholding information from the lender (mortgage fraud) and a huge risk to our applicant. The agent told me it could be done, they have done it loads of times and it would not be a problem – so confident in fact I doubted myself!
Checked in with the lender – I was right!
Checked with the conveyancer – I was right!
Spoke to the agent and as soon as I told her I checked with the lender and conveyancer she accepted she was wrong! Imagine being so confident and so wrong!
Conclusion
I think it is important to start this section by saying we do not have arguments for fun. It does not happen regularly, it just so happened that there were 2 applications at the same time which made me think this was a good idea for a post.
Secondly we would only get into that sort of situation after gaining your permission. We would never risk you losing the purchase unless we strongly felt the other side were in the wrong.
But I think this explains where having a broker onboard can make a big difference. In both of these examples, the clients would have gone ahead with things as they were presented without questioning it or if they did question it, they would likely have been railroaded into the wrong decision.
Both of these cases were relatively straight forward and should have gone through without a hitch.
Ultimately, you are our customer. We work for you. If you want to know where our allegiances lie, they are with you. The estate agent works for the seller.
We are experienced, we are confident in our knowledge (we will double check if we are lead to believe we are in the wrong), but more importantly we will fight (or argue) on your behalf because sometimes it is needed.