Key Post Has anyone approached their lender recently to reschedule their mortgage?

I would be interested in hearing about any recent experiences people have had in dealing with their mortgage lenders.

There is an older thread on the topic here, but I suspect that the practices have changed.

We're with KBC Homeloans and just approached them last week, they said we could do 6 months intrerest free only, sent us a budget spreadsheet which we had to fill out and rang them with the figures, they then told us we were approved for the 6 months interest only and sent us some paperwork to sign. All in all pretty straightforward process and have to say every time i rang i was treated nicely.

Loli

What interest rate were you on as a matter of interest? I wonder if the banks treat people on Standard Variable Rates differently from those with cheap trackers.

Friend in this situation:

He went into arrears for 8 months (Bank of Ireland) due to lifestyle spending and didn't contact the bank. BOI eventually got hold of him and made an appointment for a meeting in June 2009. They offered to spread the arrears over a 2 year period (no extra interest in their calculations for arrears) this would have cleared the arrears by June 2011

Fast forward to Feb 2010, payments being made every month. BOI rang and offered interest only for next 5 months, keep repayments the same and balance will clear arrears by July 2010

So, a win win situation!! BOI have one less in arrears a year earlier and friend has arrears cleared and payments back to normal by the summer. I really was stunned when BOI called and offered this and quite honestly think their proactive stance deserves to be commended

We just rescheduled ours with AIB

Was on standard variable

Switched to 2 year fixed rate with the first year of this as interest only.

absolutely no probs at all and very pleasant to deal with

Yes I have a fixed rate and started the process with First Active/ Ulster Bank the start of November 2009. I always thought First Active were a nightmare to deal with but they outdid themselves this time.

It has been an horrendous exercise, I have never had one of the many phonecalls (approx 20 calls made) I made to the local branch or Head Office returned. I didn't know I had been approved for a reduced payment until I got a call from their Customer Care Dept asking me how I had found the process of dealing with them on re-negotiating my mortgage which was approved early January. Despite asking them to send through the details of the new agreement at least 5 times I have not received them, although they say they have sent them 3 times to me, they would not fax or e-mail them to me.

I started this process to avoid going into arrears and to protect my credit rating, I have already missed the payment date for the last 2 payments as I had not got the details necessary to do the transfer, they done an internal transfer for the first month and the second one was about 2 weeks late because I didn't know what account to make the payments to.

However thanks to another lovely lady at the local branch who spent over an hour trying to get these details for me I've eventually got a fax copy of part of the agreement and they said it is not going to affect my credit rating, will check it out when the 6 months are up.

Cashstrapped

First Active don't have a very good reputation according to this earlier post but did well in this one.

But Ulster Bank seemed to be sympathetic according to this one.


Brendan

Just to point out that any responses to FA/Ulster Bank are dealt with by the same underwriters and have been for some time. Their process for assessing what option they will offer is very thorough but in their defence this is to ensure that genuine cases are facilitated.

the bigger banks will be very open to looking at options for there customers as the last thing they want is to reposses houses. not sure about the subprime type lenders

The website of Start Mortgages says:

Costs and Charges

If you are in arrears, we will charge you interest surcharges. We will also provide you with an indication of the legal costs you may be charged.

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I spoke to them, and while they used to charge 1% per month, they are not currently charging any penalty interest on arrears. Normal interest is charged on the total balance outstanding.

A friend told me of their experience with KBC.

Never in arrears.
Mortgage balance: €70,000
Cheap tracker
House value: c.€400,000
Years left: 7 years
Self employed and income is down dramatically.

Husband rang KBC two months ago and they sent out a big long form looking for details of income and expenditure. They never got around to filling it out.

Wife rang last week and the person on the phone asked for rough details of the income and expenditure and gave provisional approval their and then for a 6 month interest only period, subject to approval from the underwriter.

Paperwork arrived out a few days later confirming everything. No change to rate.

Customers very happy with KBC.

First active offered me a reduced payment for the forseeable future.However, on the paperwork that was sent out was a clause."we reserve the right to call to any member of your family at their place of residence or work, should you fail to meet the agreement".I refused to accept this clause and was offered the agreement.However,i was unable to meet one of the payments and i have recieved 3 letters a week threatening legal action.One letter for my main mortgage and one letter for each of my top ups.

I recently had a meeting wih PTSB to discuss my rental property which is on interest only, which is all I can afford. The problem lies with the fact my tenants have vacated the property 2 months ago, the house is still empty and i now have to fund the mortgage from my own funds which is now impacting my mortgage on my family home (PPR). PTSB were very inflexible despite all the waffle on their web page, stating talk to your lender on time to discuss all financial woes (its a load of jargon to keep the regulator happy I feel). I had asked for a 3 month payment holiday which was not entertained,I now have no option but to ammend the payments from 1000e to 100e rather than cancel the direct debit, either way i will get a bad credit rating,

Off topic comments removed. This thread is simply for reporting experiences not for asking for advice - Moderator

Dealing with GE money here at present.

I am finding them very unhelpful to be honest. I did the decent thing and contacted them before I got into trouble. They did agree initially to accept a lower figure for 12 months. Since then my business failed and I am only getting social welfare. They don't want to know. They were phoning at all hours of the day and night. I eventually told them only to communicate in writing. Social welfare won't help as it is a subprime mortgage and they deem it to be unsustainable. I am only able to muster a token payment per month. They are now threatening legal action despite the 12 month moratorium.

The situation is hopeless.

Sorry to hear that Carey, if its any help could you change your phone number?

Better still, it is now cut off.

Thanks for your support David.

I rang EBS to let them know my financial circumstances had changed. (put on a 3 day week instead of fulltime at 5 days) I wanted to know if they could do anything to reduce my monthly repayments.

They were very nice and helpful and understanding. They offered to extend the term of my mortgage for another 5 years at the variable rate of 2.3% They even did the calcualations and told me how much it would be each month.

Also they gave me details on how much it would be if I chose to fix now for 3 yrs. But that was wayyyyy high! Interest rate was 4.7% I think??

Very nice to deal with. In the end I'm not changing, but it was nice to hear my options.

Currently with EBS and have not made full payments for the last two months, have contacted them by phone and in writing and basically when I told them due to salary cuts we were finding things tough - reply I got "that's awful, will money be paid by the end of the month". Won't make any concession. Have had mortagge for last 13 years never missed a payment until now. In a fixed rate with them and the best they will do is let us out of fixed rate for €6,500 which has to be paid up front and won't allow us to add it to the end of our Mortgage term. Stress it's causing is unbelievable - I don't sleep and get severe palpatations when I think about it - at this rate we'll be cashing in on Mortgage protection first!!!

We are with PTSB. Approached them in branch recently asking for a six month moratorium on our tracker mortgage, because my contract will be up at the end of the month and its my second time out of work in the last 18 months, all savings used up. They couldn't have been nicer. I met with a mortgage advisor in the Liffey Valley branch. He worked through our income and outgoings and worked out what our monthly deficit would be there and then - no forms to bring home. He proposed a 3 months break with an option to possibly extend it, by meeting with them again in 3 months and reviewing our situation. He called me back two days later and said it had been approved.

We've never defaulted, have our mortgage for the past 5 years.

advisor said:

Currently with EBS and have not made full payments for the last two months, have contacted them by phone and in writing and basically when I told them due to salary cuts we were finding things tough - reply I got "that's awful, will money be paid by the end of the month". Won't make any concession. Have had mortagge for last 13 years never missed a payment until now. In a fixed rate with them and the best they will do is let us out of fixed rate for €6,500 which has to be paid up front and won't allow us to add it to the end of our Mortgage term. Stress it's causing is unbelievable - I don't sleep and get severe palpatations when I think about it - at this rate we'll be cashing in on Mortgage protection first!!!

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Have you sat down with a Mortgage Advisor?

Show them the Code of Conduct on Mortgage Arrears and they should treat you better. If they work out that you can pay the mortgage, then you have to pay the mortgage.

Brendan