Reply to: HSBC Mortgages Grrrrrrr!!!

[Jessica@WhiteFieldTax]

Glad to hear you've sorted it. Mortgages for self employed / contractors are always a lottery and a drama; not good when moving, renewing, etc, is stressful anyway.

A friend of mine is a (old style) manager in a bank; he describes most of the staff as "ex Argos, if it hasn't got a catalogue number they can't deal with it". Sums it up...

[Fandango]

[Boycie]

I've recently applied for one of these HSBC lifetime tracker products and been successful (subject to valuation). It took quite a while and is certainly not as easy as using a broker like I did previously but it's hopefully a cheaper product than one offered by brokers. Had to take a ton of paperwork in with me and they seemed to use the calculation as per the initial post - which despite trying to reason with, seems to be the way they do it (so you may not get the amount you wish to borrow).

[Rabotnik]

We're looking at 80% LTV deals and so we've gone with the Lifetime Tracker @ 2.79% + BOE Base Rate. £299 booking fee, unlimited over payments, interest calculated daily. No Exit fee

Lifetime Tracker Premier Standard

HTH

Seems like a good deal, I am on a tracker at the moment for our flat, so I want to get one for the house too. Thanks for the info!

[Fandango]

We're looking at 80% LTV deals and so we've gone with the Lifetime Tracker @ 2.79% + BOE Base Rate. £299 booking fee, unlimited over payments, interest calculated daily. No Exit fee

Lifetime Tracker Premier Standard

HTH

[Rabotnik]

Mini update

After still getting nowhere with the Leeds Mortgage retard, after repeatedly trying to explain to her again that dividends were split 60/40 with my wife and that they were NET, she was still calculating my income by lumping all dividends under me solely and as gross!!!

So i gave up with her and saw a non retard at the Sheffield branch and everything is sorted

Along with all the accounts stuff, i also knocked up a little spreadsheet clearly showing Gross PAYE, Net Dividends & effective Gross income for me and my wife for the past 3 years, which i think helped clarify the situation. I used the handy calculator on this site to generate the figures
Dividend Tax Calculator

They upgraded me to a Premier Customer there and then, meaning you save an additional £300 on the arrangement fee which is nice

So perseverance wins the day

Nice one, cheers for the update!

I am also looking into mortgages now, since we would like to buy a house. Would you mind me asking what rate you managed to secure? And fixed/variable?

[psychocandy]

I just wasted an hour of my life with an HSBC Mortgage "Manager". Basically i've had my broker give me a range of mortgage options for our new house purchase, however on browsing HSBC's website they were offering 2.79% +BOEBR LifeTime Tracker and if you're a Premier Customer then the fee was only £300 which beat all other quotes hands down. (this isn't offered through brokers only direct)

So after an initial enqury last week & brief headline affordability evaluation i was booked in for an appointment at lunch today to go through the application. So i brought my last 3 years accounts and all the other guff they wanted. However HSBC have a VERY strange way of calulating affordability!

The woman said they take your salary (£7.5k) + Net Profit in the company AFTER Dividends in my case there was about £15k left each year but having taken (£40k, £46k, & £60k dividends over the past 3 years), then they averaged it over the 3 years. So in my case it came out at about £20k/year!!!

and she said the computer said they could lend me 85K!!!!

She then tried to call someone for an explanation but didn't get very far and she's going to speak to a colleague as she says it doesn't seem right.

I said to her i've be invoicing between 7-10k + VAT a month for the past 4+ years, the mortgage would be about £1600/month on repayment so its easily affordable.

It's a bit ironic as they asked me last week to also come in and have a meeting tomorrow with them as well about becoming a Premier Customer which is supposedly for high earners! I told her i hardly saw the point in keeping my Premier Customer appointment with them if they only thought they could offer me a 85k mortgage!

To say i was dumbfounded was a bit of an understatement.

Despite having "Manager" on her badge she seemed almost clueless about Ltd company operation, and was very much "Computer Says No".

Anyway i'll report back once she's contacted me again!

Standard clueless high street bank....

[MarillionFan]

Mini update

After still getting nowhere with the Leeds Mortgage retard, after repeatedly trying to explain to her again that dividends were split 60/40 with my wife and that they were NET, she was still calculating my income by lumping all dividends under me solely and as gross!!!

So i gave up with her and saw a non retard at the Sheffield branch and everything is sorted

Along with all the accounts stuff, i also knocked up a little spreadsheet clearly showing Gross PAYE, Net Dividends & effective Gross income for me and my wife for the past 3 years, which i think helped clarify the situation. I used the handy calculator on this site to generate the figures
Dividend Tax Calculator

They upgraded me to a Premier Customer there and then, meaning you save an additional £300 on the arrangement fee which is nice

So perseverance wins the day

I do hope you will be complaining about the Leeds manager. Sounds like she needs some serious retraining.

[kingcook]

Good to hear

[Fandango]

Mini update

After still getting nowhere with the Leeds Mortgage retard, after repeatedly trying to explain to her again that dividends were split 60/40 with my wife and that they were NET, she was still calculating my income by lumping all dividends under me solely and as gross!!!

So i gave up with her and saw a non retard at the Sheffield branch and everything is sorted

Along with all the accounts stuff, i also knocked up a little spreadsheet clearly showing Gross PAYE, Net Dividends & effective Gross income for me and my wife for the past 3 years, which i think helped clarify the situation. I used the handy calculator on this site to generate the figures
Dividend Tax Calculator

They upgraded me to a Premier Customer there and then, meaning you save an additional £300 on the arrangement fee which is nice

So perseverance wins the day

[kaiser78]

I got my mortgage on my second property through HSBC last year. Very easy process as went through my mortgage broker who sorted it all our for us. Got great offset deal with cashback on acceptance as well.

[Wanderer]

The woman said they take your salary (£7.5k) + Net Profit in the company AFTER Dividends in my case there was about £15k left each year but having taken (£40k, £46k, & £60k dividends over the past 3 years), then they averaged it over the 3 years. So in my case it came out at about £20k/year!!!

and she said the computer said they could lend me 85K!!!!

I agree with the others, this "manager" is a bit retarded and has read the guidance wrong - you need to go and get a second opinion.

[thunderlizard]

to me that said if the applicant was a director of Ltd company...

director as opposed to shareholder?

[Incognito]

Sounds like i've seen a retard and need to see someone else!

Print this out and advise her to inwardly digest. However, if she is that thick, highlight s.20.

[speling bee]

You're right. The above makes sense if it's net profit after tax but before dividends. Taking dividends in excess of a year's profit after tax isn't sustainable.

But yes, I can't see any reason why it would be net profit after dividends. I hope for your sake they'll speak to someone higher up, be told their mistake, and hopefully then give you a decent offer.

It does sound like an error.