Help to Buy Isa scandal: We have been mislead

[Betty4321]

In the Telegraph today and sky news it turns out that 500,000 people like myself can't use our help to buy isas for house deposits. The government is back tracking on what they promised.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/08/19/help-to-buy-isa-scandal-500000-first-time-buyers-told-scheme-can/

[Gileswithachainsaw]

Shit I have one of these.altbkugh .just using it as a savings account for now but was hoping in the future...

[justjuanmorebeer]

Tory policy is a lie. Shock horror.

[markdocs]

I wasn't surprised at all. It states clearly in the guideline so.

[BombadierFritz]

Massive waste of taxpayer money either way while the nhs crumbles and apparently we have austerity

[sparechange]

It's only a maximum of £3k that is being withheld until completion though
Anyone buying a house who doesn't have a couple of grand contingency for the buying process can't afford to be buying a house
No one (with half a brain) is actually going to miss out on a house purchase because of this
It is one hysterical article, and neither a scandal nor scam

[HoneyDragon]

I know a few people doing this as they see it as a healthy whack toward stamp duty?

[NotDavidTennant]

I'm surprised as we bought using the bonus in May and never had any problems. Our deposit was less than 10% though so maybe that made a difference.

[scaredofthecity]

I was on here a few weeks about the same thing.

We have just used our isas and we couldn't use it towards the deposit but the solicitor deducted it from the final bill we paid. I.e. offset against fees and stamp duty.
From what I read this isn't how it is meant to be used but we had no problems.
It is a massive cock up though!

[Ditsyprint40]

It is very misleading but I think the media is making a bit of a mountain out of a molehill. I think it is a wake up call though to young savers and first time buyers re the expense of house buying.

[YelloDraw]

Agreed with Ditsy. Mountain. Molehill. Just use it to pay the completion statement.

If you actually read the small print like everyone is supposed to do, it would have been clear.

[Crinkle77]

It's hardly a scandal but it is misleading. Until very recently I was under the impression that the bonus would be used towards the initial deposit.

[AwkwardSquad]

I agree it's a bit annoying. But it's still free money.

[Kate555578]

Are you looking to buy a new build? We are in the process of buying a new build and about to exchange contracts so this has come at a bad time for us. However our solicitor says it shouldn't be a problem and we can pay half the deposit, and pay the rest with the ISA bonus on completion. He said that none of his clients have lost out so far.


And to sparechange, we have over four grand in our help to buy ISAs, if we take that out to pay the deposit we will lose over a grand from the bonus which would make using the ISA completely useless. It's not that we don't have a spare grand but when we have taken the time to save that much in the ISA when you can only deposit 200 a month it seems highly unfair that we then won't be able to use it.

Both me and my partner, and quite a few of our friends have been shocked we can't use it for the initial deposit as they also have accounts. When we opened the account they said at the bank that this could be used for that purpose so it has been very misleading for us.

[cexuwaleozbu]

Yes but the issue for most FTBs is getting the deposit together when house prices can sometimes rise faster than renters can save even though mortgage payments would be significantly less than rent. A contribution of £3k towards non-deposit expenses is not that valuable - these are expenses that most FTBs usually just add to the borrowing amount so it is merely giving people £5 per month off their mortgage repayments which, while gratifying obviously, isn't helping those who are struggling to get to the point of buying because in the time it takes for them to save £3k the amount of deposit they need goes up by another £3k.