As it turns out there is no such thing as a smooth house move. This is not entirely unexpected news based on my previous experience of house moves and the general anecdotal evidence. However the really disappointing aspect for our particular situation is that everything had gone smoothly up to this point and over 2 months had passed.
It now seems that, although we have done everything asked of us, the mortgage company do not really want to lend us the money. There is still an outside chance that they will come back with a revised decision in the next day or two but if I’m honest I don’t hold out much hope for that!
The sequence for our mortgage application went something like this:
- Existing customer porting existing mortgage deal – not a problem
- Mortgage affordability – not a problem
- Loan to value – not a problem (less than 50% being borrowed)
- Full structural survey of the property – not a problem
- Mortgage deal offered – No
I wish I could sum up what the problem is with our application but even though I’ve asked a number of times there is never a clear definitive answer. There is some mention of the fact that there are 2 title deeds that make up the whole property and also mention of the agricultural land but according to our solicitor neither of these points should be enough to refuse a mortgage deal.
Unfortunately we had a similar response from our initial enquiries with another high street lender so it sounds like most “ordinary” lenders don’t want to be bothered with any mortgage deals that involve anything out of the ordinary.
The upshot is that in these difficult financial times meeting the lender’s stated criteria for affordability and risk is just not enough to get a mortgage offer.
So we keep our fingers crossed that Plan B (a mortgage consultant) can find us someone who will offer us a mortgage so we can save the deal. In the meantime, we continue to wait in a kind of “no mans land” where there seems little point doing anything major to our current garden and veg beds – it’s hard to generate any enthusiasm at the moment even for the small jobs!
I’ll just keep reminding myself that the glass is half full and there are plenty of other people worse off than us!
Today is exactly 1 year to the day since 
There has been a great deal of progress over the last year with the focus on vegetable growing plus the introduction of the chickens. However I’m still very aware that we have barely scratched the surface in the world of smallholding and the knowledge we lack outweighs the knowledge we have gained so far.
So our current house is on the market with a local estate agent now even though the decorator is still finishing off some painting in the kitchen. As seems common in this situation we have high hopes of early interest but don’t know whether buyers are out there and we can expect any serious offers.
We have managed to build up a list of around 5 places which meet many of our original requirements but sadly (and unsurprisingly) none of them meet all the points! Now is the time for some serious property viewing, detailed note taking and extensive internet research so that we’re ready to make our move when a buyer is found for our house!