Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

[Tools]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Just as an aside, you have obviously been struggling for some time now. Would I be correct in assuming you will have incurred some bank charges or credit card charges. If so it may be a small help to contact your bank to reclaim these charges under FSA hardship waiver terms. Even if it is a few hundred pounds reclaimable, you can use your mortgage arrears as evidence of your hardship and get the charges refunded, possibly directly to Cheshire/Blemain which would help your situation. The timescales are against you but at least it may be an option once you apply for suspension of the possession order.

If you have incurred any late payment or overlimit fees on credit cards, again, look into reclaiming them as soon as possible, every penny helps.

Also as Amethyst has stated already, a copy of your defence would be useful.

[magiciansgirl]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Good luck for the interview; keeping fingers crossed.

Kind regards, MG

[stressedout]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Amethyst - Defence has already been sent to the Court and I don't know how to put it on here anyway!! I did it myself as I do have a bit of knowledge about Court papers - my "job" is a legal secretary! - but this kind of thing is not really my area of law!!! To be honest, nice as she was, the lady at the CAB didn't really have a clue.

Scoobydo - mortgage is a repayment. I realise that mortgage must be a priority but when the income we have is barely covering food, electric and gas (which are both on pre-payment metres) the ability to pay the mortgage is very limited. Fortunately, we don't have any credit cards or loans. In fact Cheshire have already said that they cannot capitalise the arrears over a longer period of time because they don't sell mortgages direct, only through brokers, and it would not be possible to do this.

Tools - I have a charges claim against Abbey National for over £3k which was put in Feb/March 07. I have seen posts about hardship cases, but don't know really know the procedure for that. I did think that would be a possibly to claim hardship, but as you say time is not on our side. I will look into it though.

I also sent in my reply to the witness statement that I received from Cheshire. Not really sure if I needed to send a response, but it annoyed me so much the way they lied about following protocol and having discussions with us. How they managed to do that without actually speaking to us is a bit of a mystery!

A bit of goods news though - we have now heard from the housing assocation that they will consider a buy back of our share. There are a couple of things they want to know, and will take it from there. Obvioysly, it's not a definite yes, but they had already said no, so it's a turnaround.

Interview went well today, but I probably won't hear in time for the hearing.

Thank you all for your advice so far on this. I think that as long as we can get a suspended order, that will give us more time to either sell the property or the HA buy back.

[scoobydoo]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

the reason I asked if the mortgage was repayment was I was wondering if you have asked if they can transfer you to interest only for a short period of time. However this may not help much if you are at the begining of your mortgage - just a thought.

I understand what you are saying about your priority bills if you have a family - When I was a green young person dealing with arrears I would say to a borrower - "you may pay your electric but if you dont pay you rmortgage you wont have a roof over your head for your family". Now having had a family myself I undertstand the very difficult priorities that have to be juggled. All I was trying to say is that id you can pay [art of the mortgage then you should do so as the court will take that into acount - and they have the final decision.


Also I have seen the comments about capitalisation from other lenders - then suddenly when they get to court and the judge gets involved they suddenly discover they can change the terms of the mortgage.


I would start the proceess with the Abbey - check out the hardship success forum - send a letter - identify yourself as an urgent hardship case - say you are wiling to have the charges paid direct to the mortgage company to avoid possession and see what happens - for the sake of a letter and sending an Income and expenditure form it is worth a tgry and you could also explain this to the court who MAY perhaps take that into account.

[magiciansgirl]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Stressedout, glad the interview felt okay. Re Cheshire saying they can't capitalise the arrears because they don't sell mortgages directly to consumers, this is a blatant lie. I've had several sales calls from them and in one conversation they were encouraging me to take my first mortgage away from HSBC and put it with them. I decided against so I don't know whether they would have brought a broker in further along the line, but the fact is that the initial approach to me was from them directly. Hope this is helpful. Kind regards, MG

[stressedout]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Magiciansgirl - yeah I guessed that Cheshire have not been entirely truthful in their approach. In their witness statement they have stated that on several occasions they have had discussions with us regarding the arrears. How they managed to do that without actually speaking to us still remains a mystery!

We've had a letter from the housing association this morning stating that they have requested information from Cheshire (they don't say what) but have yet to receive a reply. This doesn't surprise me at all because Cheshire have not replied to any of our letters. We have even twice now tried to get them to adjourn the hearing in order for the HA to sort out the buy back - again no response. I don't think this will go in their favour as I think the Judge will look at this as wasting costs and Court time.

At this stage, it looks as though we will have to attend the hearing - something I'm not looking forward to!! We are pinning our hopes on the HA coming through with the buy back and I just hope the Judge does allow more time for this to happen. We don't really have any realistic payment proposals at the moment and I don't think this will go in our favour.

[magiciansgirl]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

I would stress their punitive charges and that they are sub-prime. By which I mean actually call them sub-prime lenders when talking to the judge, and I think the judge will prick up his ears (or hers) at that. I would also stress your rate of interest in the current economic climate.

[stressedout]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Well, had the hearing this morning. Managed to see the person from Shelter who was really helpful and came into the room with us. He said that we should go for an adjournment so that the HA can carry on with the potential buy back.

We said that looking at the figures again, we didn't think they were correct. it's a repayment mortgage and nothing seems to have come off at all. We needed a separate breakdown of how they have arrived at the figure they have quoted.

The person acting for Cheshire was absolutely vile! I'm so glad that Shelter came in and spoke on our behalf because I would have defo lost my rag. She queried why we had re-mortgaged and said we had used the proeprty as a "cash cow!. Bloody cheek. We did no such thing. She went on and on about negative equity.

Shelter brought up the fact that Cheshire had not complied with protocol, not offered any help whatsoever.

Upshot was we got an adjournment for a month.

When we got back there was a letter from Cheshrie about the charges added to the ascount basically saying that they can charge what they like, we were aware of it and even if they phone 7 times a day, so be it!!! Flaming cheek. I think a complaint to the FOS is in order here.

So, got a bit of a reprieve, but I have to say, that even though we were really prepared document wise, (even the guy from Shelter was impressed) if people go to Court unprepared and they get someone on the other side like we had, they will be eaten alive!!! Really shocking she was. Her attitude was unbelievable

The Judge was quite nice really, even he raised his eyebrows a couple of times at what she was saying!!

[WendyB]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Well let's hope you get the same judge again the next time, sounds like he/she would be on your side. I am not the one to advise what to do before the next hearing, but someone will be along soon with some suggestions I'm sure. It's good that you've gone in and challenged them, most of the time people are too scared etc, then vile cows like their solicitor get away with blatantly disregarding protocols and walking all over people. Well done you for standing up to them!

[enaid]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Well done stressedout, not a very nice experience for you I know. It is experience though and hopefully next time this will have helped you and it won't be as bad.
I think in a way some of these people have to be as nasty as they can to do the job, I really think they must block off their true feelings, or they couldn't do the job, rather like emergency services, just my thoughts on it, that's all.
Thank you for sharing this with us , I am sure if anyone else has to go through this and reads your posts it will help them no end.
Enaid x

[stressedout]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Just want to say thank you to everyone who has advised me on this - it's really appreciated.

Also, Cheshire have added over £1800 in charges to the account!!! They even had the cheek to charge for the "advisor" that came knocking at the door a few days ago - I knew they would do this. I thought they had to inform you if they were going to send someone round? Perhaps someone could clarify this?

[scoobydoo]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

I dont think they are in a position to criticise you for borrowing the money - after all they are the ones that should themselves be doing a risk assessment when they loan the money. The responsibility is really joint between lenders and borrowers IMO.

As far as the debt is concerned if you are on Repayment then really for the first 10 years ( say on a 25 year mortgage)or so your payment nearly all interest and your debt decreases extrememely slowly - then towards the end of the mortgage you pay more and more of the capital at a faster rate

Well done for having all your paper work in order and attending the hearing and lets hope the H/A can help you out.


To check the debt figure they used you need either to check all your statements or send an SAR letter to check for charges and fees and or commisssions that may have increased the capital ( original amount borrowed)

[stressedout]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

I was thinking of firing off a letter to Cheshire to claim back the charges added to the account as I've read that a lot of others have done this. Is this a good idea?

I know what they have charged because they've sent me a statement of charges.

[scoobydoo]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Have the charges been included in the arrears figures?

[magiciansgirl]

Re: Help: Repossession Cheshire/Blemain

Good news, stressedout. I wonder if Shelter would be able to help with your next defence now that they're aware of your circs.? Sorry to hear the Cheshire solicitor was so vile. Sorry, but not surprised.....

I strongly suspect that Cheshire won't answer the HA letter/s because they are unlikely to have been sent recorded delivery. I know you've got a lot on your plate but obviously you don't want to risk the buy-back not going ahead because Cheshire won't respond, so I would keep a very beady eye on this in the next couple of weeks. Hoping you get that job!