A remortgage application I thought was fairly standard turned out to be one of the most stressful cases I have encountered in a long time, but my persistence paid off in the end.
I was first contacted by the client on April 26 this year. It was a pretty standard case, a remortgage with no additional borrowing.
The only thing slightly complex was that one of the two buyers, the wife, was on maternity leave at the time.
This isn’t usually a problem for lenders as long as we can evidence it will be affordable while on maternity and also most lenders will use back to work terms for affordability.
The current fix ended on August 1 and given we had three months I was not concerned about this running over.
I received all necessary documents and information from the client and made my recommendation with the cheapest lender, which was an extremely well-known high street bank.
We applied for the mortgage on May 6 and what followed was one of the most unnecessarily stressful and horrendous applications I have encountered in the past six years.
The first issue occurred on May 12, when the lender offered a maximum amount that was £1,600 under what was requested and the reason given “based on income scored”, which I went back and disputed.
This is due to the fact we were using the client's basic income and the wife's return to work income only.
The client also had a monthly bonus and additional part-time self-employed income, which had not been used due to the fact the case was affordable based on the lender's calculator.
On May 16 the underwriter requested return to work conditions and savings proof for the client while on maternity, which was provided.
On May 22 the case was once again max loaned to £138,000, even less than before, with no reason given.
The lender refused to accept a screenshot from an app of the client's savings despite it being a well-known platform, and of which it was very difficult to provide a full statement.
Following this I went back and advised the lender of the client's other incomes and also supplied another screenshot.
The screenshot was refused on May 26 and self-employment documentation requested on June 1.
This had now been going on for nearly a month and the screenshot of savings was still declined.
We eventually got round this problem by offering a statement that had the client's name and address on and served as proof that it was indeed the same account as on the screenshot.
At this point I contacted my business development manager for help, who agreed with me that the case seemed fine, however the underwriter’s budget planner was £20 lower than we needed.
I went back to my BDM explaining that the net income from self-employment, maternity and savings per month was the same as the current net income from the wife's employment.
