• Remortgage

    By Guest on 14th Nov 2016

    At the point of signing to remortgage with a different lender we were told that as part of the joint mortgage was to consolidate individual debts we would have to appoint a solicitor and provide the correct documentation to show we understand the implications of this. The initial quote for which was over £900. Having been together for 18 years, owning property together for over 13 and married for 8 whilst the debt may be on individual credit cards it is joint anyway. Is there any way around incurring these extra charges?

  • 2 Answers

    By Guest on 14/11/2016

  • By Guest on 18/11/2016

    Not if your lender has specifically asked for this. The reason you are being asked to do this is because of a famous (in conveyancing circles) case of Royal Bank of Scotland PLC v Ettridge. In brief, Mr and Mrs Ettridge took a mortgage on the matrimonial home with RBS. The remortgage funds were invested in a business which Mr Ettridge owned but Mrs did not. When the business failed and RBS sought to repossess Mrs Ettridge argued that she should not be bound by the mortgage since she did not in any way benefit from it, that when she signed the mortgage deed she was under undue influence from her husband and it should have been obvious to RBS that the nature of the relationship between husband wife was likely to lead to undue influence. The court agreed and said that in future when lending money to two or more borrowers a bank had a duty to ensure that any borrower who did not directly benefit from the mortgage advance should be given independent legal advice.

    Your situation is a little different of course in that reducing your household debts would in practice benefit you both. You should ask therefore if the lender has expressly requested this or whether your lender has decided it is necessary based on his professional judgement. If it is the former then you are stuck. If it is the latter then whilst I don't mean to question your lawyer's judgement it might be worth asking him/her to present the facts to your lender and ask for its instructions on whether it wants you to get the advice. If it is does then you'll have tyo but shop around as £900 seems steep and you could probably get it cheaper.

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