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Kitty97

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  1. Hi again. Have had report of hearing from the duty barrister with details of what was said and what we need to do ahead of the next hearing. Before we put in our fuller defence to Santander/the court, should we try to come to an agreement with them ahead of the hearing? With my husband’s pay rise and consultancy retainer we could pay the mortgage and arrears now if Santander extended our term. Given the circumstances that got us in this position, our daughter’s continued issues but the improvement in our finances, is this reasonable for us to ask for? Thanks again for all your advice thus far.
  2. 5 days before. It said on the accompanying letter to ensure it was in at least 2 days before the hearing (obvs weekend not included). Was absolutely gobsmacked that judge had assumed that no defence had been given! A&C work for Santander out of their Newcastle practice. I think they started out as estate agents, hence, I guess their rabid attempts at outright possession-no doubt they just want to get their hands on our house cheap to sell at a stonking profit for themselves. We’re down south where house prices have gone crazy.
  3. So we got the hearing adjourned. Despite handing in a VERY extensive defence pack last week with a load of attachments with our letters of proposal payments, evidence of the severity of our daughter’s illness, valuation of house, it hadn’t been passed on to the judge so he hadn’t looked at anything!! He had a flick through the copy we’d brought with us and said he couldn’t read through all of that with the time he had. Rottweiler solicitor from Aberdein Considine barefaced lied to the judge saying we’d made no contact with Santander before we’d got letters from them threatening legal action (I’ve got loads of correspondence and will ask for more phone transcripts if necessary) and that no payment proposals had been made before the date of the court claim (again a lie as I have correspondence). She said the Norgen case was no defence, that the valuation of our home/equity was meaningless and that basically we had no defence. Despite numerous assurances from Santander that they weren’t looking for repossession, solicitor asking for outright possession. Obviously the fact that would make our daughter ill again and we’d have no business is of no consequence to them. Duty barrister did a great job considering he had about 15 mins to look through our case. He passed your supplementary defence re: my husband’s pay rise and consultancy to the solicitor before the hearing but she just said they were going for outright possession. we’ve got 28 days to prepare a full defence and will get legal representation for that. Duty barrister said to do that first and then discuss further proposals to put to Santander before the hearing. As well as a request to change the type of mortgage to interest only (7.1 of pre-action protocol?) we’ll also ask to capitalise the arrears and extend our mortgage by 5 years which would make the mortgage payments affordable. Duty solicitor did right to suggest he did all the talking as finding out that the judge hadn’t even read our defence when Santander’s solicitors seeking outright possession was such a shock and thankfully he worked that to our advantage, especially as the judge could see how copious our notes were. Otherwise it would probably have been over for us in 5 mins. My answer to no 27 on the defence form ran to 4 pages so I’m furious that it hasn’t even been looked at! we’ve won the battle but not the war yet. The Rottweiler didn’t look at us once or try and engage in any way before or after and looked more like a bulldog sucking a wasp when our duty barrister handed her a copy of our defence pack and judge allowed an adjournment so I’m sure she’ll be out for blood now. Any further advice would be very gratefully received!
  4. Just looking up the Act. Should I include the amendment-Section 8 of the Administration of Justice Act? Would that help our case too??
  5. Thanks so much for taking the time to do this. I really appreciate it. I know I’ll probably have to bite my lip re: interrupting. I’m hoping I can keep calm and not be a sobbing mess-unless that’ll help our case My husband hasn’t had confirmation of the consultancy yet but the company seem keen to take him on so hopefully that’s imminent. Don’t think he’ll get it before the hearing though I’m hoping that as Santander’s solicitors have stated that we haven’t made any proposals of payment when we have and the fact that I have it recorded that “higher management” have refused to consider any proposals (other than full immediate payment of the arrears) the judge will instruct them to work with us to agree a payment arrangement especially given our daughter’s circumstances and the fact that taking our home from us would also end our business and I’d be unemployed
  6. That would be great-thanks so much for your help. Do you think the judge will look on our circumstances sympathetically and ask Santander to work with us to get through this? I cannot get my head around the possibility that we could be ordered out of our home considering what would happen. My husband has been talking of how we’d be better off without him. He’d been doing so much better with his mental health as things started to improve with our daughter and our finances but he’s in a really bad place atm and I need him to be strong for Monday
  7. If my husband gets the retainer we could do that but only not enough towards the arrears atm to clear it in 7 years as we just wouldn’t have enough to pay everything else until our business started paying more. Santander have told me they’re not repossessing atm (despite the possession claim) so when we tell the solicitors about my husband’s pay rise is there any possibility, given our family circumstances, that they may consider agreeing reduced payments for now or even changing our mortgage type to interest only? If they take the house, we’ll have no business either but more importantly, the ramifications with regards our daughter’s mental health are beyond serious.
  8. We’re not in the position to be able to pay the mortgage plus the arrears at the moment. Even with the pay rise my husband is hopefully going to agree, we’d only be able to do full arrears (spread over the remaining term) plus interest on the remaining mortgage or the mortgage payment plus the interest on the arrears. Once the business is back up and running and the consultancy starts to pay commissions though, we’d be able to start paying lump sums or change to paying both the full repayments and arrears. Given the amount of equity in our home though, do you think the judge might agree to our proposal of either capitalising the arrears and changing the mortgage to interest only (more than affordable and with the ability to pay extra on top) or the part repayment/part interest only option? House valued at £650-675k+, mortgage £125, arrears £100k.
  9. Bless you-that would be so helpful! Re: case precedents-no. I did look to see if there was anything but didn’t want to quote anything I wasn’t sure was relevant or correct. How would the A of J Act or Norgan case law help us?
  10. We have got copies along with other notes to refer to. We’ve also submitted a budget sheet and proposal. At present proposal is to pay the interest on the capital and arrears plus a bit over but if my husband gets his pay rise agreed tomorrow we’ll be able to offer to pay either the arrears plus interest on the mortgage balance (which I assume would be preferable as it would clear the arrears over the term) or the other way around-the monthly mortgage payment plus the interest on the arrears. Both options with the aim to pay lump sums when possible or pay the monthly mortgage payments plus arrears (capital and interest). As Santander do offer interest only/part and part we’re asking for either of these options as paying the outstanding mortgage at the end of the term would still leave us with plenty to buy another property (although, as I said, our aim would be to pay it off by then). Santander have told us they don’t offer interest only with sale of property as repayment vehicle but they absolutely do-with the proviso that there is at least £150k equity. We currently have £425-475k equity according to valuation last week. Given all of that, do you think the judge is likely to look favourably on us? We’ve been through so much as a family but to have our home taken from us now that things are finally starting to improve would absolutely destroy us
  11. We’ve explained our circumstances with regards our daughter’s illness and how it affected us (with proof in the form of consultants/psychiatric reports etc), my husband’s depression, what happened with the business, how things have improved and are looking to improve further and the fact we’ve put two proposals in to Santander and we’ve had no written reply with reasons for refusing and no attempt by them to discuss any alternative arrangement other than immediate payment of the full arrears.
  12. Any positive advice gratefully received. Last minute I know but we’ve got a possession hearing this coming Monday and I’m terrified we’re going to lose our home. We’re £100k in arrears (yes, I know) having had the most awful 4 years. Our franchise business suffered a downturn when we lost an account with a department store chain that went under and another major department store up north along with a number of franchisees. At the same time, our daughter became very ill with major depression and psychosis leading to severe self harm and suicide attempts. I had to give up work to look after her as our local CAMHS was so understaffed plus I would normally have customers come to the house, something that was impossible due to our daughter’s illness as it escalated so quickly. She was hearing voices and seeing things and pretty much went mad for a couple of years. Her home and keeping everything the same in it, to the extent that we could barely move anything, became increasingly important to her as she was so paranoid about any change. She was eventually also diagnosed with very high functioning ASD/Asperger’s which explained some of her obsessive behaviour and had been something she had apparently been masking for years which resulted in the depression and psychosis. My husband also suffered depression due to the business collapsing and our daughter’s illness and some days was bedridden. We kept Santander informed at all times that we were unable to pay the mortgage during this time and sent evidence of the severity of our daughters illness. We then had the pandemic which affected our business still further. During this time, Santander just asked us to keep them informed as to how we were doing and that nothing would be done with regards the continued arrears. Meanwhile, of course they kept us on a super high interest rate just under 5% (while they advertised their sub 1% deals) and piled on those charges. Our daughter’s drs finally found a combination of meds that helped her and she was able to start uni with support (she is studying physics) although she still needs everything the same at home to help her cope when she has a bad depressive episode or an ASD episode. She is on maximum doses of anti-depressants and anti-psychotics, has twice weekly counselling and regular checks from uni security when she is there. Thankfully they have a very good disability unit. The head of the physics dept says she’s the most gifted student he’s had in his 10 years there. My husband’s depression is getting better, he has found a separate job and we are restructuring our business. He has also started a consultancy and has a number of agreements and contracts in place that he is working on which would enable us to make lump sum payments. We told Santander last summer that things were starting to improve and asked if we could agree a payment arrangement to either change our mortgage to interest only with the sale of the home as the repayment vehicle (we have 7 years remaining) or change to part repayment/part interest as at the moment the capital and arrears are too much. We have around 65-70% equity in our home. Santander refused to discuss any arrangement other than immediate full payment of the arrears and the monthly mortgage payments and began proceedings the day after restrictions on doing so were lifted. Surely having, in effect, allowed us to build up 4 years of arrears due to our circumstances it is unreasonable for them to suddenly demand immediate full payment as soon as they find out our daughter is not on 24 hour suicide watch atm? The person I spoke to in the Vulnerable Customer dept even suggested she must be “fine” if she could manage to go to university! They’re obviously well trained in the complexities of mental health….not. Given our circumstances, shouldn’t Santander work with us and give us time, now that we are able, to get back on track? How do they think that after the 4 years we have been through we can magically summon up £100k just like that?! Losing our home would mean losing our business (I have a home workshop I need for what I do) just as we are building it back, not to mention the shock to our daughter who obviously knows nothing of this. I have spent 4 years getting her to a place where she’s spending more time thinking about quantum physics than trying to kill herself and the shock of being forced from her home would take her right back to the worst of times. Given the improvement in our finances and equity in our home, surely the judge would allow us to continue to make partial payments (we have paid 4 months of the interest on the capital and arrears since October) or interest only, which we can more than afford now and would give us the ability to concentrate on improving our situation, something that is nigh on impossible atm with this hearing hanging over us like a Sword of Damocles. We are confident that we will soon be able to make lump sum payments but this isn’t going to happen overnight. Husband due to hear tomorrow re: promotion and pay rise plus a retainer for a consultancy so we’re keeping our fingers crossed. It’s all heading the right way but I was literally told by Santander it was just unfortunate that things were getting better for us when they’d decided to take us to court! Apologies for the length of this. If anyone has managed to read it, I would be v grateful for any advice on how to tackle things on Monday. We have sent in an extensive defence pack outlining our circumstances and proposals and will have a duty solicitor on the day but otherwise we’re on our own here.
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