Reduced Mortgage Arrangement coming to an end...

[Bel18]

Hi there

Not really sure if Ive posted this in the right section...

We have our mortage with UB and 2 years ago we approached them to discuss reducing our payments as I had been made redundant and although we never missed a payment ever, we needed some breathing space as things were and still are tough.

The 1st year there was no problem doing this, the 2nd year we advised UB that I had thankfully gotten part-time work so they increased our payments a little which was fine. This is year 3 - and last month we were notified that our payments would be going back up to the original full amount of €1500. (The past year we have being paying €1070). Last month I was given full time hours in my job up until May of next year. We were delighted with this but still not on the pigs back by any means. I made another appointment with UB and went through another Financial assesment with them, (over the phone as they dont deal with this in the branch any longer) and they have advised me that I/we can well afford to pay the full amount now and have 400 approx surplus per month. therefore they are not willing to help us any further. This 400 or so is really nor surplus believe me!

I do appreciate that we were very lucky to receive help from them, but having to go back to paying our full mortgage as soon as I have just gotten full time hours and was finally after years of struggling and stress getting a bit of a breather, we are back to almost square one. And at this time of the year too is devastating.

My husband reckons we should pay maybe 1200 in Nov & Dec and then start paying the full amount in Jan - just to get us over Christmas...would anyone recommend this?

Sorry for such a long post - we're just up the wall with worry. Thanks in advance if you've managed to read this far!

 

[Bronte]

Welcome to AAM Bel. You ideally should ideally do the money makeover thread. Where is UB getting the surplus 400Euro from do you know? It must be coming from the figures you supplied them.

 

[ellenb]

I would recommend getting an appointment with MABS to discuss your standard financial statement. Or even do it over the phone with them as waiting times are long. I then realised there were a number of things I either had forgotten to include, such as Xmas/birthday presents and house maintenance and I had not budgeted enough for other items such as personal care. They also recommended looking at ISI figures.
You can also easily access the ISI living expenses chart from their site. Table 6 applies to my family. It spells out what you should be able to manage on and covers pretty much everything for adults and kids depending on their age.
Word of caution though my lender refuses point blank to accept figures for clothing and lifestyle expenses from them. However I haven't really made a huge argument about this as we still can't afford to pay mortgage with those expenses at nil.
You could Advise your lender that you are going to speak to Mabs and will continue pay what you can afford in the mean time.
If you really can't afford full amount make sure to cancel DD and pay mortgage manually. This does not guarantee they won't still take the payment but they would have to refund you in the event they did take the full amount.
Think there are a lot of us worried about Xmas and I hope you find a solution. And great news you got more hours!