Halifax Mortgages

Advantages: good for 1st time buyers
Disadvantages: did not offer a good rate after fixed term ended, overcharge customers

...*This is the second review I posted on Ciao and have edited it as it needed more information and an update* For the purpose of this review I am writing about my experience of having a mortgage with Halifax and am not reviewing Halifax and it?s services as a whole. I am very much aware that for some they have had a great experience with them, but for me after being a loyal customer for such a long time. I felt that they had let me down and recently I realised that I had overpaid when my mortgage came to an end and successfully received a refund from them. Halifax is a leading building society and has been providing mortgages for many years. I had been a customer of Halifax for over 10 years as my parents insisted when I was younger that I had a Building Society savings account (at the time it was the Little Extra Club) so that...

sweetdaisy 21.10.2006 (19.08.2007) · Read review
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Review of Halifax Mortgages

Mortgages, Mortgages & Mortgages

Advantages: Not many unless you like parting with ££££
Disadvantages: Loads of errors, poor communication

...We have just terminated our Mortgage with Mortgages Plc at the end of our one year fixed deal. We had to go down the route of self certification as my partner had a job which paid heavily on commission, making it difficult for a high street lender to give us anything more than 65% loan to value. We went through a broker and he came up with a deal through Advantage Home Loans, a sub company of Mortgages PLC. The deal itself was OK, we had expected a higher rate for self cert candidates, it tied us in for 1 year. We thought the quote was good enough to continue with and we propmptly found a place and put an offer in, we got a quote again for the amouts we would be paying per month from Mortgages Plc, the quote seemed fine, we could afford it and it set out their charges which they informed us could be added to our final loan amount...

memphisto_chick 12.02.2006 · Read review
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Review of Mortgages Plc

Kensington Mortgages

Advantages: You get what you need out of them
Disadvantages: Obscenely high interest rates, no reward for loyalty.

...I took over a mortgage with my partner in 2005 following her messy divorce and our of desperation with all the debts her ex left her. We were directed to Kensington via a local Broker, which I have now learnt to be probably more to do with their high rate of commision to the broker and little to do with our own personal circumstances. The most they would offer us was £60,000 despite the value of the house being £30,000 more. This was largely due to the absolutey massacred state of my partners credit rating because of the joint finances the ex left her paying..... and the fact I was only on a modest full time wage (NHS!) By the time all the kinks were ironed out, including removal of a charge on the house thanks to the cursed ex, we were relatively happy to have settled, had enough left over for the rest of the double glazing...

jedimasterlincoln 21.01.2008 · Read review
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Review of Kensington Mortgage Company

mortgage

Advantages: none
Disadvantages: very expensive and our always delaying by 2 months plus ? joining they interest rate drop

...hi every one heres the snag iv got 2 mortgages kensington & capital home loans kensingtons mortgage £233.000 im paying £833 a month capital home loans £296. 500 im paying £433.00 a month im also in a tied in for 3 years with kensington wich ends in december thank god £14000 charge if id of sold before my 3 year contract ended as plus they dont allow you un der no circumstances to be able to draw down off your property no matter how much equity you.v got also there lack off comunication . so in a nut shell big deposit ? high rates compared to other lenders? impossible to draw down ? and if you should lose your job ,and youv built a lovley extension on your house your shnucked, they cant even get repossetion prices.{1} my advice dont go self cert .{ 2} if you.v got a big deposit keep hold off it and rent why 'buying is dead money...

BOOTSO 02.05.2009 · Read review
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Review of Kensington Mortgage Company

First Direct Offset Mortgage

Advantages: First Direct - great offset mortgage
Disadvantages: Too easy to access the equity in your home!

...The first thing that attracted me to a First Direct (a division of HSBC Bank plc) offset lifetime tracker mortgage was that it was listed at the top of the 'best buy' tables on moneysupermarket.com. A quick search revealed that it had also been voted the best lender for customer service in the Which? Money survey on mortgages 2008. This was the second year running that First Direct had come out on top. With a score of 90% first direct was 11% ahead of its nearest rival in the survey of 18 lenders. First Directs mortgages have won numerous awards over the years, the most recent being What Mortgage Magazine's winner of Best Direct Lender over 5 Years (February 2007). In January 2009 their offset mortgage was one of the lowest rates on the market. Although I was not actually looking to remortgage at this stage because I still had nine...

Krazikas 28.05.2009 · Read review
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Review of First Direct Mortgages

Future Mortgages - a misunderstood lender

Advantages: An excellent sub prime lender with very competative rates
Disadvantages: They only deal with brokers or mortgage packagers

...the same rates as high street lenders, when you can not prove you are a good payer. Let's look at it a different way. Would you lend someone £200,000 if they had a consistent history of non payment and there was a big chance that you might not get that money back? No, you wouldn't. But if you did decide to lend them the money you would certainly charge them more for the privileged of it in order to make sure you started to re-coup the money! Also, since Future Mortgages rarely, if at all deal direct with customers to sell their products, it is not their fault if someone has been miss-sold a product. I would suggest that would be either the responsibility of your chosen mortgage broker, and frankly, there are some unscrupulous characters out there that do not explain things well and do take advantage of their customers' good nature...

Pixie1979 05.01.2008 · Read review
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Review of Future Mortgages

  DESIGN your Mortgage INTELLIGENTLY....

Advantages: flexible, available for 95% mortgages, interest calculated daily, no arrangement fee, no indemnity premium, no tie in period, online/ telephone 24hrs
Disadvantages: lacks personal touch, not available for 100% mortgages, (mortgage deeds not stored), may not suit older persons i.e. up to 65 years due to age restrictions

...Buying a house can be one of the most exciting yet stressful things you may ever do and unless you have thousands stashed away in an offshore account or have just won the lottery, chances are you will have to apply for a mortgage to buy your dream home. There’s no time like the present if you are thinking of buying a property; Bank of England’s base rate has remained low at 4.0% for over a year; so, it could be a good time to borrow. The types of mortgages are endless; fixed rate, capped rate, tracker rate, ISA mortgages, cash back mortgages (ha ha, makes a mortgage sound like getting cash-back on your Switch card at Sainsbury’s!) variable rate, flexible etc, etc. I know looking at mortgages can sound incredibly boring but when one considers how much time people spend on buying fashion accessories or advance booking...

Connoisseur_Haggler 30.12.2002 (02.01.2003) · Read review
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Review of Intelligent Finance Mortgages

Woolwich Open Plan Mortgages

Advantages: Payoff chunks of mortgage whenever you want. Offsetting saving accounts, interest calaculated daily
Disadvantages: Can be tempted to borrow to the max

...We've had a Woolwich Open Plan mortgage for just over seven years. On the whole we have been very satisfied. The mortgage work by allowing you to set up a number of accounts and under Woolwich a number of saving pots, ie mini accounts that cannot be overdrawn, which can be offset agai9nst the mortgage. In simple terms this means all of these funds are taken off the mortgage total and interest is then calculated on the result. We set up pots for a new car, holiday and for a small inheritance, which was to be used by our daughter to help her through university. We also had a reserve that is an extra amount of money that we could borrow at the mortgage rate. In our case this was around £20,000. As you npay off the mortgage this amount increases. We now have an overdraft facility of around £70,000. While the acount...

odtaa 07.11.2008 · Read review
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Review of Woolwich Mortgages

Mortgage Express - a waste of space

Advantages: A freephone telephone number, good incentives such as free valuations
Disadvantages: Poor customer service

...I am a Mortgage Broker who offers mortgages from the Whole of the Market. I must admit that 2 years ago, Mortgage Express were highly competetive with their rates and offers, but more recently, I never seem to source them when it comes to finding my clients mortgages. Overall found their service slow and at times I found that they changed their lending criteria to suit themselves at times, meaning when I recommended a mortgage to a customer, I then had to tell them that they were not eligible. This obviously reflected badly on me. They offer a freephone number which is rare these days, however, you have to be prepared to hold on the line for a good 35 minutes in order to speak to somebody. This somebody may not be very understandable either and may not have a clue what you are talking about!...

Rachelxoxo 11.09.2008 · Read review
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Review of Mortgage Express Ltd

"The Broker" by John Grisham

Advantages: Takes you into Italy and schools you on it. I was satisfied with the ending
Disadvantages: Too much filler in this thriller. Plus, the pacing was sluggish

...In the Author's Note there is the following disclaimer: "It's all fiction.. I know very little about spies, electronic surveillance, satellite phones, smartphones, bugs... If something in this novel approaches accuracy, it's probably a mistake" and also: "Im more terrified of high-tech electronic gadgets today than a year ago". Reading this makes me ask my self, Why then did you write this book? Well further in the Note, we find that it was his love for Bologna (The city that the plot is centered in) is what he really did research and came to love. That is why instead of legal thriller.. we have now ended up with.. an Italian Guide Book with a dash of a spy story. "The Broker" is drenching in all things Italian. From its edible delicacies, to its art and also endless (and I mean endless) amounts of story where the main character is...

zenmachado 17.12.2005 (18.12.2005) · Read review
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Review of The Broker - John Grisham