Mortgage broker question

[Sundayschild4]

Hi all
Saw a mortgage broker last week and gave them details of what we are looking for and they sent us a mortgage in principle. We are instructing EA this week and haven't yet started viewing properties.
The fee the mortgage broker charges is a lot higher than we were expecting and to be honest I think I could match the same rates she found through comparison sites. We're pretty straight forward and not looking at maxing out what we could potentially borrow.
Question is - can I apply for my own mortgage when we found a house and just not contact the broker again? We haven't signed anything and her fee was on completion only

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If you've not signed anything then I suppose there is no obligation to go through with her service. However my mortgage broker was a shining light in the communication disaster between our useless estate agent and our useless solicitor, so don't underestimate the value of that fee!

Exactly as the poster above. Our broker pretty much did all the chasing as our EA was useless.

Our broker also made sure the other parties mortgage offers were solid and the chains were complete and ready to go as to reduce the chance of the chain collapsing.

You can negotiate on the fee - we got ours halved just by asking

Interesting thanks all! We didn't use one on our first property purchase so still not 100% clear what the benefits of using are. Will definitely see if there is wiggle room on the fee. £500 was quoted, does that sound about right?

I haven't ever paid a fee at all for using a mortgage broker! (3 times in total).

I met with them and after all the details, they showed me a list of everything suitable and why they recommended the top 3 deals/lenders which I chose from. I saw on the paperwork they got paid about £700 by the lender after.

And yes they helped a lot with insider knowledge about good/bad lenders and contacts to hurry things along when needed.

I think ours was £500, but we got £1000 cashback on the mortgage product which we used to pay the fee IIRC. Worth it for us!

There is no need to pay a fee to see a mortgage broker!! They get a commission from the lender, and many don't charge a fee now. Look elsewhere.

That's what I thought! So was very surprised at £500 will try phoning around some others

@Sundayschild4 wow that is quite steep. We paid for a mortgage broker and their fee was just under £100 and they managed to get us a rate that wasn’t available directly from the lender.

We've used MortgageGym in the past and currently using Habito for our new build purchase.

Both fee free and whole of market.

Habito is pretty much all online based, MortgageGym is a mix of phone and online.

They have all done the chasing for us, cant fault either.

Some brokers charge as fee depending on the loan amount. A very small mortgage would mean the broker would earn a pittance (0.3% of the loan) e.g £100,000 mortgage they would earn £300. Not a lot for a lot of work so a fee would normally be charged. Higher loans would not command a fee.

Try www.absolutelymortgages.co.uk as an example.

I've always used London and Country and found them very good. They do not charge.

I have a disaster with London & Country (look at the reviews online) in the past which made the whole house buying chain I was in collapse...so many people let down and suffered un necessary stress...I wouldn't touch them with a barge pole.
I use an IFA who charges £300 but the personal service is worth every pence and he really helped moved the process along so much quicker than if I had applied direct.
My case is slightly more complicated because I have a job and in esteem to which pay me an income to top-up my earnings, a lot of lenders couldn't get their head around this...having a broker rather than myself explain in worked...not sure why...but it did.

Investments not esteem

Was not impressed with L & C

L&C are ok if there are no hitches, but they've got too big now.

I would go for a local person you can go and eyeball if needed, rather than be on the end of a call centre.

Our broker has taken stress out of the whole process. Also he was able to get us rates that weren’t visible on online sites and as my husband is paid in dividends aswell as salRy he got us a mortgage that we couldn’t get by ourselves.

I am a mortgage broker. We charge £99 for re-mortgages and £299 for moving home/first time buyers. Like someone mentioned above, low mortgages do not earn us enough money from lenders so a fee is necessary. There are a lot of hours put into sourcing mortgages, doing calculators, agreement in principles, full mortgage application, paperwork that has to be filed for the FCA, chasing solicitors etc.
People do it themselves, but find it much more stressful.
I wish you luck

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Go to an ifa not one that's attached to an estate agents my husband is one and I know they do better deals

I used a broker on my first mortgage on my own in
March 2008, he recommended a 2 year deal at * % was the best for me I sat from the first month watching mortgage rates fall and fall whilst I was stuck on a very much higher rate for 2 years! Since then I've sold and bought 3 times (hopefully moving on 3/9 again) and I've never used one again and would never pay for one! I can (and do) research and find my own deal. I get it if SE or other complication but otherwise I wouldn't.