Repossession Help Needed please...

[Jacqueline07]

I have a repossession hearing next Monday (30th) with Preferred. I am, currently, trying to re-mortgage at the moment and hopefully it will be through by this date but I'm trying to cover my back. Preferred have been absolutely awful to deal with and their "service" has been attrocious. I would be grateful on comments of the following:

 

Paid quite happily 'til mid last year when close family member needed financial help. Each time I paid Preferred - I enclosed correspondence explaining the situation. However, each time I either sent reduced payment or missed a month they would charge £35.00 - if a cheque bounced they added on another charge but did not even write to acknowledge my letters. I have received no correspondence from them since October last year.

 

Then in March I received notice of repossession hearing from the court with their documents attached from their solicitors which including the following:

 

My name was listed incorrectly - Mrs "Firstname" "middle name" (as surname)

Dates incorrect for redemption (quoted current figure as at April 2004)

Stated that they had made every effort to contact me to discuss arrears (this is an outright lie - no contact made for 5-6 months).

 

I have already sent a letter to the judge stating the above facts but have yet to file my defence.

 

Then last week (bearing in mind that the mort. brokers are trying to push another mortgage through) I received a letter saying "please find enclosed your redemption statement - we have charged you £15 for this" - there was no redemption statement enclosed and

 

Their solicitors have sent a copy of my redemption statement to the solicitors I used 4 years ago when I moved in. I no longer have a relationship with these solicitors and its only because an acquaintance works there - she rang me and asked why they had received it.

 

I also disagree with their arrears figure. The actual arrears of the mortgage are half of what they are stating - the other half is charges and solicitors fees.

 

I would be so grateful if someone could advise if I can submit a defence objecting to the fees and also to complain about the breach of data protection act by sending my redemption statement to the wrong place. I believe that the solicitors costs do not warrant what they are charging bearing in mind the errors that they have made.

 

Many thanks for bearing with me with this post.

Jackie

[Bona]

If you have arreas then you do not have a defence take all the papers with you and ask the judge to suspend the order while you re mortgage also ask him to make the mortgage company verify all there additional charges and ask him to make an order for you to see all invoices and breakdowns of bills from solicitors that have been added to your account . If you can show that you can pay the mortgage off in a reasobable time that will do You may find that you have to re mortgage and then fight for your charches back

[Jacqueline07]

Thanks Bona - I'm working on this today. I am going to combine my "defence" (because there were reasons why my mortgage payments were late/reduced which I told Preferred about) with a witness statement and combine all of the above including the disagreement about fees, sending information to a thirdy party without my consent and the fact that I'm currently swapping my mortgage over. The sooner I do this the better - Preferred are not only very difficult to deal with but they are incompetent aswell. BTW I am currently paying a horrendous rate of 4% above libor - this is crippling us but couldn't get out because of ERC.

 

Thanks for any further comments

Jackie

[Jacqueline07]

I have just prepared a statement to fax to the court detailing the reasons why I was late making payments/failed to make payments last year and the errors that Preferred / their solicitors have made. I have also stated that I believe their arrears figure to be wrong in that some of this is charges and the case law behind this. Will the judge object to these statements at this stage do you think? I don't want to be too *cheeky* in what I say but it seems like a good time to bring this information out. Preferred are expecting me to sit at the hearing and not say a word, I'm sure, but since joining this site, I feel more able to speak up for myself - I just don't want the judge to think that I'm using this as an excuse. Does this make sense?

 

Jackie

[Bona]

No. the Judge will read your statement and listen you should be able to tell from what he says what he feels listen to what he says there are more and more District judges who do not like repossessions for the sake of it If you have good reason for your arreas and if you can in a reasonable time pay them back the Judge will be on your side say as little as possible some of these Barristers say to much read friendgeorges thread if things go wrong there are ways round it nothing is lost at this hearing just sit tightwait and see and reply to the Judges questions when asked truthfullu Im sure you will be fine I will keep my fingers crossed keep in touch

[Jacqueline07]

Bona, once again, thanks. We should, fingers crossed, have changed over the mortgage at the latest the day after the hearing. I'm looking forward to a fresh start. With that though, I haven't really got a proposal for paying back the arrears other than the whole mortgage will be redeemed. Will this go against me for not trying to sort our the Preferred situation? Preferred knew in mid March that I was changing lenders but have delayed the situation with errors etc.

[Andy Williams]

Hello there,

 

Is this the first time they have taken you to court? Do they currently have a Suspended Possession Order?

 

No Judge in the land will issue an outright possession order at an initial hearing unless the defendant doesn't turn up at the hearing or has no realistic chance of paying back the arreas.. and this means no chance.

 

Taking into consideration that the admin of your existing lender may be awful, still try and work with them. Again all lenders will agree to suspend a possession order in first instance so long as you agree to pay arrears back, usually over 2 years. You can claim back unfair charges once you remortgage.

 

However once initial suspended order is given if you default on payments you would have to go back to court to stop full eviction.

 

Explain that you intend to remortgage to Judge with back up documentation. Judges follow the law but are loathe to grant repossessions. They will give you every opportunity.

 

Finally and most importantly you must tell the Judge that you can AFFORD THE MORTGAGE REPAYMENTS. Explain why you have missed payments and that you intend to remortgage or sell but ultimately say you can afford to pay monthly repayments. This is the criteria by which Judges are supposed to decide whether to grant repossession or not. However it normally only comes to this when someone has been back to court on several occassions and agreed to repayments which they have not kept. Then the Judge has to use this as his point of Law....whether you can afford repayments.

 

Don't worry but do try and agree with the Lender to a suspended order in the short term, then even if your remortgage is delayed you will be fine.

[Jacqueline07]

Thank you to all that replied. The hearing went well this morning. Judge took notice of my witness statement and decided to address the two issues - the arrears AND my claims of unfair fees/treatment by Preferred.

 

I did as was advised and only spoke when asked - there was a lot of tooing and froing with the representative from Preferred. He refused to grant a possession order and adjourned the case for 28 days - Preferred must now disclose their costs within 14 days!!! (this refers to charges [direct debit returns, arrears fees etc], solicitors costs and an erc charge). The erc charge is one months interest (I am now out of the tie-in period) - however I argued that I had given more than enough notice to Preferred that I would be redeeming the mortgage. He questioned why there was an ERC charge on a mortgage of over 4 years old.

 

He said that I may have to cross-claim (?) if the re-mortgage has gone through by then - however, when I asked if this direction will be null and void if I have re-mortgaged by then he said no - I have made an order.

 

He talked about the low level of service given by Preferred and their represenative asked to have the particulars changed to reflect my proper name. The judge agreed but at no cost to me. He wasn't impressed with the solicitors or Preferred (or that's what it felt like).

 

He also mentioned the onslaught of claims like these that the courts were being inundated with however "not one has yet to get to the court room";)

 

Once again - thank you for your replies - any comments on the above would be appreciated - I'm feeling quite good after that.

 

Jackie

[GLADSTANES]

Hallo.

 

Am I correct in thinking you have now redeemed your old mortgage that was in arrears with Preferred?

 

Gladstanes

[Jacqueline07]

Not quite - its just going through at the moment.

[Bona]

great keep the faith

[Jacqueline07]

I am sooooo mad - just had a phone call from my broker - saying that the solicitors will not release a redemption figure because of the court order for Preferred to disclose costs.

 

I rang the solicitor and they begrudgingly agreed to do it but with projected costs for the time taken to complete the order.

 

My original redemption figure then went up £3000 when they did this :o .

 

I wanted to pay a few remaining bills with the overspill of £4k - now I'm left with hardly anything.

 

I am so angry at this - £3000 for a witness statement.

 

However, my new mortgage should go through tomorrow - I am now more determined than ever to go back to court in 2 weeks and convince the DJ that these charges are unreasonable (if not outrageous).

 

Rant over

[Bona]

Ask the DJ for all the costs by solicitords to be assessed point out that you have probablly been charged VAT on them and your Mortgage company have probally claimed it back so they get it twice find out if you can before hand if they are VAT registered the way it works is that the solictor bill Mortgage Company not you Mortgage company put bill through there books and pay solicitors they then charge you full amount including VAT so they claim it back and then get it from you it can add up . also as them for a copy of all the solicitords bills by the court case and if they dont give them to you as the Judge to make them.

[Jacqueline07]

Thanks Bona

 

The order made by the judge was to be in by yesterday. I have just rang the court and they have not, as yet, received it, even though i have been charged for this work :o . I will be ringing every day now to check to see if they have it - unless they send me a copy as well. This involves detailed explanation of the solicitors costs.

 

My remortgage also went through yesterday so I no longer have an association with Preferred. However, the court today told me that this didn't matter.

 

I'm just wondering whether to contact Preferred now - or wait to go back into court - date sent for early June.

 

Any thoughts?

Jackie

[TimeToStandUp]

I was taken to court but agreed with the mortgage company that all arrears would be paid within 12 months, and they stated that it would be a suspended possesion and should I miss one payment then they would reapply to the courts.

 

That gave me time to look around for a better mortgage offer, and now I remortgaged and now going to take them to court for unfair fees

 

Which I would imagine if at least 3 or 4 k.

[Jacqueline07]

Update - went to court yesterday - Preferred tried to get me to agree to not go into court as they were withdrawing (we have now re-mortgaged) - I chose to go in as they had not complied with the order from the previous judge adequately. They (solicitors) had also tried to intimidate me by letter saying I will incur further costs. Since re-mortgage I have received lots of incorrect paperwork ("you still owe us £XXX please pay immediately) as well as lots of other dreadful mistakes which just goes to show how automated their systems are.

 

The judge very kindly transferred the case to small claims - Preferred now have until 29th June to submit their defence to my original statement re: their charges and costs. The amount is £6,018.00 but judge was adamant it stayed in small claims. This now allows the existing paperwork to be transferred and I don't have to pay a court fee until AQ stage.

 

AQs in by 20th July.

 

Jackie

 

If a Mod reads this could you please change thread title to "Jacqueline07 V Preferred" - many thanks

[mrsfoot]

Hi Jackie

 

Well done for keeping strong.

 

You seemt o have plenty of evidence of the automated services.

 

When you say the Judge "kindly" transfered it...dont undersestimate your argument. He / She has placed it in small claims through you showing a good case and putting together a tight argument for that. Well done

[Jacqueline07]

Received the defence to my counterclaim - absolutely no bones in it at all. I need to send back the allocation questionnaire by 20th July.

 

Preferred have been ordered by the court TWICE to explain their charges and they have failed to do so each time - stating it was in their terms and conditions etc.

 

When sending back the allocation questionnaire - can I "respectfully" ask the court to strike out their defence.

 

The fees are: returned cheque fees/arrears fees/solicitors fees.

 

On 30th April, the DJ ordered for Preferred to explain ALL of their charges and fees and they failed to do so - wanting to withdraw the claim because I had then re-mortgaged by that time.

 

I counterclaimed (which included details of their appalling administration errors ) which the DJ allowed and ordered Preferred to put in their defence.

 

Any advice please - I don't see the benefit of adding the draft directions as the judge has already ordered disclosure and they have failed to do it.

 

Many thanks - Jackie

[mrsfoot]

Hi Jackie

 

I would write to the court and ask for the defence to be struck out as they have failed to comply with the Judges orders in the manner in which they should have. make the letter out to the Clerk but ensure you put the Judges name in the letter so it can be referred to him.

Hope this helps

[Jacqueline07]

Allocation hearing Monday

[jaxads]

The very best of luck X

[Loonychoons]

How did you get on?

[Jacqueline07]

Stayed until the outcome of the OFT case. I'm glad in a way cause the judge allocated it to fast track (over 5K) and they have quoted unbelievable costs!!!

[midge61]

Hi

 

If the previous judge stated that it should be heard in the small claims why has it now been allocated to fast track? Surely you can write and ask for this to be changed back as you are a one person fighting a large company. seems unfair to me.

[Jacqueline07]

Believe it or not - it was the same judge - I was astonished when I heard him say that - he wasn't having any argument at all. I tried the "I'm a litigant in person" bit - but he said something like "that is the level for the track" and that was that. He did not want the hearing to go ahead and make the opposite decision of the OFT case - mindful of further costs if any side then wanted to appeal.

 

I felt almost relieved to get out of there - its wait and see now.