charge against a property but lender can't trace details

[Blushingm]

My late mothers house is up for sale and they've gone to exchange contracts but there's a charge against the property by the Halifax back from 2003

We have contacted Halifax but they say they can't trace any details of this charge - they are refusing to remove the charge in case it hasn't been satisfied even though they can't find any details for it.

The buyers solicitor is not willing to exchange whilst this charge is there which I can understand but we don't know how we can get it removed.......has anyone ever heard of this situation or have any idea what we can do? TIA

The charge should have been removed when the mortgage was paid off. Was the mortgage paid off? Or do you need to get it paid off now with your late mother's life insurance?

for you

Thank you

The sale of the house will pay off the mortgage - the charge by the Halifax is separate to the mortgage.

She didn't have life insurance but had a death payment from her pension which my brother kept as he was her nominee for dealing with the pension (can only have 1 nominee and he took that as my mother meaning for him to benefit solely rather than pay off mortgage or splitting if between the 3 siblings - but that's another story!)

Hmm, sometimes people have a second charge against their property when they've re~mortgaged, or taken out a further loan using the property as security.

That's what we thought - she may have taken out a secured loan but when we have contacted the Halifax to find out how much is owed etc they say they have no records of it at all. Not even a settled loan

Well I don't think they can just leave it there forever. Ask your solicitor to write to them asking that they come up with the details of the charge or remove the charge by a particular date (I guess three weeks or whatever the solicitor thinks is an acceptable time) or further legal action will be considered. I guess the next step after that would be the banking ombudsman, but that would probably take time and you might lose the buyer.

We are worrying the buyer may pull out which would be a real pain for both sides