Owning your own home

Brokers aren't magicians; anything he can find, you can find yourself without paying a fee, provided you're prepared to invest some time. If your time is worth £650, then by all means go with him.

Some people tell me to go to an IFA, others say save the cash. Confused.

IFAs are school leavers with a certificate.

Ask yourself what value they are providing.

Mine explained lots of stuff that I'd no idea about. He was worth the 300 or so quid I paid. He was also recommended by someone I trust and so I could trust him also. This is important when you're putting all your biccies into a pile of bricks.

I've just called the estate agent about the two flats I'm seeing tomorrow: one is now under offer. They won't tell me how much for. I pointed out that I may be willing to go higher, and they said they still can't tell me. Baffling.

I'm also confused about this IFA thing. It is a lot of money to pay, but he'll find a good deal and guide me through the process.

This is important when you're putting all your biccies into a pile of bricks.

Do you live in a gingerbread house?

I've just called the estate agent about the two flats I'm seeing tomorrow: one is now under offer. They won't tell me how much for. I pointed out that I may be willing to go higher, and they said they still can't tell me. Baffling.

I'm also confused about this IFA thing. It is a lot of money to pay, but he'll find a good deal and guide me through the process.

A decent agent should still show the property even if if is recently under offer. Only when both sets of solicitors details are in and communication has started should it (kind of) be left alone. So many deals get agreed on a Thursday/Friday, only for people to find something else over the weekend on zoopla etc and the agent arrives in on Monday morning to find the deal has fallen to bits.

If you like it and really want it you should get the survey in sooner rather than later. This demonstrates to the agent and the vendor that you're willing to spend money and proceed at a pace which suits all.

Then you can negotiate to remove it from the market etc.

The vendor doesn't actually have to stop marketing the property, but can refuse to entertain any further viewings on it. This is only really important if it's for sale through multiple agencies.

IFA and mortgage broker are not necessarily one and the same. IFAs can give advice about a range of things, including savings and investments. A mortgage broker will basically look at your financial position, LTV ratio etc, and find the best mortgage product from what's available. Most don't charge you to do this, but get a commission from the lender.

Which is why they'll push you in certain directions.

My IFA never charges but gets some back end commission from the products he sells.
Last time he had to recommend a First Direct mortgage as best. So he made nothing.
He DEFINITELY had access to more deals than were on moneysupermarket.com etc... but not by much.

Frankly for £650 on a c.£100k mortgage I would do the work myself.
You are going to have to do the paperwork anyway.
All he does is give it the once over to make sure you have filled in the right boxes (sort of like the Post Office passport application check service).
And then he can chase the application while the bank sits on it for days, loses the paperwork, send paperwork to the wrong address etc...

As long as you have a plain vanilla application (i.e. not self-cert or self-employed...) moneysupermarket will tell you the best deal and you can apply direct.

I mean £650 seems a lot for not much to me.
I would FAR rather plug that into a proper survey.

My IFA never charges but gets some back end commission from the products he sells.
Last time he had to recommend a First Direct mortgage as best. So he made nothing.
He DEFINITELY had access to more deals than were on moneysupermarket.com etc... but not by much.

Frankly for £650 on a c.£100k mortgage I would do the work myself.
You are going to have to do the paperwork anyway.
All he does is give it the once over to make sure you have filled in the right boxes (sort of like the Post Office passport application check service).
And then he can chase the application while the bank sits on it for days, loses the paperwork, send paperwork to the wrong address etc...

As long as you have a plain vanilla application (i.e. not self-cert or self-employed...) moneysupermarket will tell you the best deal and you can apply direct.

I mean £650 seems a lot for not much to me.
I would FAR rather plug that into a proper survey.

We're using the in-house broker from the agent we're buying through. He's charging us £99 but gets commission from the lender we go with. For the guidance he's given us, and the time he's spent going through stuff with us, i'm surprised he's not charging us more (£250's his top price). We're out in the 'burbs so he won't be much use to most people on here.

He doesn't try to push us to certain lenders and genuinely seems to want to find the right one for us.

We've just been refused by Nationwide due to the Survey results. :-(
So he's seeing what he can do at the moment.

Meh. Had called Gales estate agents Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday to arrange the viewing for The Woodlands today - explicitly said several times that my dad was driving down from Norfolk to see it, so I needed to know if it fell through so he didn't waste a journey. Got there at midday, a different agent was there from another company, who let us in. Gales called ten minutes later and asked if I still wanted a viewing. They weren't even sending anyone. I told them to stick it.

Anyway, the second agent also mentioned subsidence at The Woodlands, as had the other one last week. She couldn't tell me how bad it was though. She also told us that the flat was up for £125k, then when I started saying that I wasn't really interested as the subsidence issue kept being mentioned, she told me that the owner would take £112k...

On to the other flat I saw today (didn't really like it), where the agent from yet another company heard me mention The Woodlands and went on a huge rant about how they're best avoided, that there had been subsidence problems for around 15 years, that many banks won't lend on it and surveys often came back with big warnings. Basically he said that lots of people own there who can't sell and lots of people try to buy there and waste money on surveys before finding out the truth. Notorious for it, apparently.

So... back to square one I guess.

Sorry to hear that Sparky, sounds like you've not had the best of times.

Better to know now though rather than once you're eye deep in debt

Sorry to hear that Sparky, sounds like you've not had the best of times.

There are far worse problems in the world to have, but I have been sulking a little bit today.

Better to know now though rather than once you're eye deep in debt

This is true. I haven't actually forked out any cash, and it sounds like plenty of other people have fallen into the trap of getting a survey before finding out. What I don't understand is why agents are wasting their time trying to sell it if they know that surveys/banks will get in the way. The second agent I spoke to says his company just won't have anything to do with the place, no point...

Mortgage broking has a reputation as a bit of a snidey trade, but I reckon a good reason to use a mortgage broker is that they can speed things up.

If you look around the internet for consumer reviews of the cheaper mortgage providers (Santander, Nationwide etc) there are loads of stories from people stuck in call center queues for hours, people having their applications lost in the system several times over, papers returned with the wrong information etc, etc. All of which again means that you might miss out on your dream home. But a decent mortgage broker can contact the bank on dedicated phone lines and will have their own contacts inside the bank/building society. More than the "getting you the best deal in the market bla bla" I reckon you are paying a few hundred quid to skip the queues.

Still, 650 quid seems a bit much. And be wary of the broker selling you add ons such as payment protection insurance.

Stuart our mortgage broker was a total diamond. His only payment was the commission from the lender but he went above and beyond to get our deal sorted out. PM me if you'd like his details.

I used these people last year when a consortium of us bought a small block of flats by buying each flat individually. The broker had to get 11 mortgages spread far and wide around different lenders to avoid any nervousness on the part of the lenders and whilst still getting good buy to let deals for us all. He worked hard on the project and charged a fee of £600 per flat which I felt was very reasonable for the work involved.
The guy we dealt with was able to speak to contacts within various lenders to push things along when we hit a couple of hitches along the way.
As above, I can give you Richard's contact details if you so wish.

Yep, I think the alarm bells are too loud on that place. It's a shame because I really liked those flats, and it looks like I'll get nothing with that sort of space elsewhere for the money.

two bed shared ownership in woolwich, worth investigating? > http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-33562165.html?premiumA=true

3 bed repo above a shop > http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-32798152.html?premiumA=true

2 bed repo in charlton > http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-20338254.html

Do you live in a gingerbread house?

Don't be silly.

Bourbon Cream.

Dirty boy.

What do we think to this? http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-31469272.html

Gah!

Signed contracts today. Waiting for exchange...
Our mortgage offer runs out on 21st May, people we are buying from need to give 1 month notice to tenants. There is no spare time....

STOP ASKING MORE QUESTIONS!! We need to exchange tomorrow.

Am going to have an anxiety attack.

Can't you extend the offer?