Refused remortgage - what to do

[notbeenagreatday]

I've posted in legal too but thought might be some more advice over here

So under the terms of my divorce I'm due to pay ex husband a sum of money next year. I am in the family home as have young children and always earnt 3x ex so can cover the mortgage easily.

Was mulling over moving house so rang to discuss with my current mortgage provider today - who after doing a soft check flat out refused to offer additional borrowing on my current mortgage to pay him so I can't move and I can't do additional borrowing!

I'm shocked. They said they based it on my Experian Report - but I've duly registered and my credit score is 1000/1000 - literally cannot improve on it.

What am I supposed to do? They said it could be due to ex husbands credit rating (they are so wishy washy with what they are allowed to say) but I have no control over whatever debt he might have had if he used this house before he moved out as the registered address other than asking him to change the address details? I can't ask him to run his own credit report - we don't have that kind of relationship?

My salary is circa £85k per year and my current mortgage is £170k and I need £60k so well under borrowing multipliers

I re fixed at the end of the last fixed deal so that has 4 years to run without incurring early redemption so can't change lenders.

OP mentioned she's the main earner, so removing her ex from the equation shouldn't impact her finances. Yet, she's struggling to get the multiples needed for a mortgage—that just doesn’t add up. It seems unfair, especially when single mums are navigating a system that often feels stacked against them. I know a few who’ve chosen to live in buy-to-let properties, making it work for them in a system that’s unsupportive. As long as the mortgage payments are made, it’s hard to see a moral issue here, even if it’s technically committing fraud. Who is being hurt? The mortgage markets are hardly a beacon of ethics themselves, are they?

Not got time to rtft but have you tried London & Country? Good luck

i actually mortgage lenders are ethical especially since 2008, mortgage regulations, tcf and now consumer duty… none of which those people who are living in a BTL property will have the protection of. They are harming themselves.

right so, the reason OP can’t take additional borrowing now is because her ex is still on the mortgage, he is on the legally binding contract so she alone cannot make an amend to it without his presence and consent.

as discussed residential mortgages are regulated, meaning that there are conditions that the lender must adhere to. Responsible lending is one. So when a mortgage contract is varied in a material way, affordability must be reassessed, this isn’t misogyny, it is to ensure that the borrower can afford the mortgage (this is the mortgage conduct of business framework and it’s how you can product switch without having to do a full remortgage). A material change is adding or removing a borrower, and surely you can see how it is in the best interest of the borrower and the bank to ensure that the people who they are lending to can actually afford it. None of this means she’ll fail affordability it means that they bank will do some due diligence in the background.

the system is not stacked against women, that’s a preposterous statement to make (and yes I’m as feminist as they come) the market is stacked against single borrowers. Society places the burden of care on women. But OPs child related costs should be split 50/50 assuming joint custody.

We bank with Barclays & applied for a mortgage with them.
We were denied & they said it was because of something on our Experian.

So we checked Experian & there was nothing.
As someone else suggested we went to an independant financial advisor and got a mortgage from the halifax no problem.

Go to an independant financial advisor. It's well worth the money.

@Ohforgodssake123
Women couldn't even get a mortgage until 1974
I don't think it's prepostorous statement at all. It’s still unfair that, in affordability tests, the financial weight of dependents often falls more heavily on women, even if their partners share responsibility.

Yes I have a call booked for tomorrow!

Yes this is exactly what I'm finding and I actually argued this as part of the divorce to delay paying him until next year when twins are at school - ex left when my twins were 1 so you can imagine the childcare costs full time to enable me to work - but I have always paid the childcare from my accounts - so when the bank does affordability checks they will have seen this (although since they started pre school the cost has dropped dramatically)

My affordability to the bank is lower even though I earn 3x what ex does

Sounds like it's a common theme

Just kicking myself that I'll end up with a big early redemption charge but small price to pay to be rid of him

But we’re not talking about 1974 we’re talking about 2024, we can lament the misogyny of days gone by til the cows come home but it’s not helpful here.

how many affordability tests do you run on a daily basis? So you’re telling me that men with the same dependents if a single father can borrow more than a single mother when the salaries and expenses are the same? Absolutely not

@Ohforgodssake123

I think in that example you are right - a single father vs single mother

But as most single mothers are the ones who pay for the childcare that's when the unfairness creeps in

Most nurseries childminders etc won't split your bill over two separate parents. And legally as a single mum I can't force my ex to pay for half the childcare bill although the kids are half his. I can't even force him to pay childcare on "his" days (if he had any - which he doesn't)

That isn't the fault of mortgage companies of course

It's a society problem that places the financial weight and responsibility of children - in a divorce - largely on the mother

thats my point, it’s a shitty fucking society that places the burden on women and utterly ludicrous that he shouldn’t split the childcare cost because he has them on weekends for instance. BUT that’s not the bank, they’re assessing your affordability (in a society that lets men get away far too lightly). But part of your affordability is your outgoings and if you are paying for childcare, then yes that’s your outgoing.

i know we love to hate banks but it’s not for them to solve patriarchy or climate change through mortgage lending

When i spoke to my mortgage lender, I cannot afford to take on the mortgage myself on my salary, we have a joint mortgage, i was told as long as i can afford the mortgage payments, and put all bills and mortgage coming out of my own account, they could take it to the underwriters to agree to remove him off the title deeds, as long as the ex is ok with it. 3 months worth of bank statements to show i can afford it.

Try this approach? I dont know if all lenders offer this. I am starting this process.. but thought it might be useful to try

@Evecob

Thanks, I'm pretty sure affordability wise they said it spoke be fine to remove him. Since they said I could port my existing mortgage into my sole name but either as part of the move or even just to pay him the divorce settlement I need additional borrowing and that's what the bank has said no to. It's not my personal credit score as it's 100% perfect - it's to do with him?

You can use the mortgage charter to change to interest only or stretch the term to the longest possible to reduce your monthly payments and save the rest of that.
Then personal loan for 25k.

Can you get a lodger in too?

You could also move money into your tax free childcare account in advance and pay it directly from that so that no child care costs show up on your last three month bank statements.

Personally, I would ask the mortgage advisors people have recommended for free advice to clarify, but I would think wait until June for two reasons, one you will look more attractive on paper for increased mortgage amount due to overheads decreasing and secondly it will be six months before you need to do the transfer so will give you time to sort out the transfer and remortgage as you can lock in a rate 6 months prior.
In the meantime I would be cutting back and saving/reducing overheads as every £1k saved is one less that you have to find and especially true from June to December next year.
I have also heard on these boards that some lenders don't count CMS money (mine did) so maybe check if yours does.

Have you done an actual application. We had similar with a soft search for a credit card recently but when we actually applied it was no problem, the soft search and hard search criteria’s were different.

Sorry if this has been said multiple times 🫣

We have a much bigger mortgage which was arranged with a similar single income ( anlso construction, it’s the best well paid career secret and needs more women!) and more kids!

I hope you get it sorted, L&C have always been great in the past when things have become tricky with mortgages.

Hi yes I do this at the moment - but it will obviously be seen on the bank statements and the bank will know what's for?

Ha no lodger - im in a 3 bed semi detached with one bedroom with 4 year old twins and an 8 year old 😂

I attempted to yesterday but was told flat no to additional borrowing

I've spoken to a broker of sorts today as I looked at a new build and they did an initial assessment - also mentioned that for some reason whilst all the credit score companies score me personally as 100% excellent the system was saying I was only "fair" so again adds to the suspicion that it's me association with ex husband that's causing the issue

I'm about 75% decided that next month - once my final loan payment is made - im going to apply to my current lender to remove his name from the mortgage (only costs £185) that way I can then request a notice of dissociation across all the credit score companies