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Info on Capstone Mortgages Please


Moonrose
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My friend has a remortgage with Capstone Mortgages (thanks to her errant husband running up mega debt) and has been trying very hard for the past two years to keep her head above water. They also have an IVA.

 

She turned up unexpectedly on my doorstep today after driving 300 miles. She is a very worried lady. Her husband is a compulsive gambler/liar and a couple of years back borrowed a substantial amount of money securing it against their house. He forged her signature to do this (if it had been my husband I would have had him arrested and can't understand why she did not. Probably because she loves him:roll: )

 

Anyway, the building society they were with threatened to repossess their house so they eventually found a company willing to give them a remortgage - Capstone Mortgages. A couple of months ago they missed a mortgage payment and now find they are broke as soon as their salaries go in the bank because of Capstone levying interest charges on them.

 

They are in grave danger of losing their home again and I don't know what to advise them or how they can get out of this situation. She has written to Capstone but is still waiting for a reply.

 

If they sold their house, they live in an area where house prices aren't rising as quickly as the rest of the country and there would be no collateral in it and they wouldn't be able to buy another place anyway. I'm not sure they would be able to get a council house either as their children are grown up and left home.

 

Has anyone had dealings with Capstone and if so how did they get on, or can anyone advise how they can deal with this problem?

 

I live in a little council house and suddenly my little home is so much more appealing than it was this time yesterday. I'm glad I don't have the worry of not being able to pay a mortgage:)

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We are with Capstone and have opted to go into rented accommodation due to their exessive interst rates and arrears charges, we are currently undergoing repossession proceedings after they insisted even though we have a buyer, but there mortgage is taking a little longer to go through

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I know what my friend earns per month as she told me. She earns more than her husband and it is well into 4 figures in her own right. Add his wages then, they should still have enough to live on reasonably comfortably even though they've got an IVA. From what she tells me Capstone is very slow in answering letters she has sent, even letters sent by recorded delivery.

 

Before she is broke as soon as her and her husband's salaries go in the bank, Capstone must be charging a collosal amount of interest.

 

Personally, I think sharks like these should be put out of business.

 

My husband and I have been thinking about buying our council house. After hearing and reading the horror stories about the various banks and lending institutions, I don't think we'll bother:-|

 

Keep us posted about how you get on with Capstone please.

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Hi

 

A couple of points worth noting

 

Capstone does not lend money. It is a servicing companmy

 

The loans are provided through LMC, Preferred or SPML.

 

All 4 companies are wholly owned subsidiaries of Lehman brothers

 

In terms of how they deal with borrowers these comapnies are all the same. This is because they sercuritise (that is sell the income rights to the loans). Investors buy the income rights to the loans but only because these firms give certain warranties about how they have assessed the loan and that thye have acted in line with their regulatory and statutory obligations

Because of this pressure is put on these firms to ensure that they collect the monthly mortgage paymen. In certain circumstances these firms would have to buy the loan (rights to the loan) back if it did not perform within certain parameters

 

You may have asce for misselling/negligence if it can be proved that the loan was obtained frauduletly annd that at the time the loan was taken out it was obvious to he lender that this was the case

 

You will need to obtain all the loan documentation and look for any obvious floors. Self cert is a good one, did our husbande apply on this basis

 

there are no guarantees thst this wll work but worth a try

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Thanks for that - very interesting as to how Capstone works.

 

I will stress though that this does not concern my family (thankfully) but is seriously affecting my best friend. I know she is struggling to keep the roof over her head and I'm worried for her.

 

The unfortunate position she is in is that she moved up north about 4 years ago and the house prices up there are not moving as fast as down here in the SW of England so at the moment there would be very little collateral in the house if any at all. If she sold it she would probably still owe Capstone a considerable amount of money. Certainly, there wouldn't be enough for her to buy even a smaller place like a flat. It is a nice house (I've visited her there once) with 3 bedrooms, an attic room, large lounge and kitchen. For what she paid for it you couldn't buy a 1 bedroom flat here where I live.

 

She scraped up enough petrol money last weekend to drive 300 miles down here to visit myself and her parents who still live down here. I think she just needed to get away from the stress for a few days. I'm going up to visit her for the weekend in a couple of weeks time and would like to be able to give her something to work on.

 

She's in a very difficult position (and also has a husband with a gambling habit which is how she got into the mess in the first place).

 

She's not on the internet either so can't come on this forum, hence I'm asking questions for her.

 

It's certainly put us off from buying our house from the Council. I don't think I could cope with what she's going through just now:(

 

What also worries me is her husband has cheated her out of money more than once and she won't throw him out and I'm sure he'll do it again and again. If mine ever did something like that, I'd throw him out so fast his feet wouldn't touch the floor!!!

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Hi In have a mort with SPML handled by capstone. If you go into arrears they charge £50 per month admin fee and interest on the arrears.

 

I think they must have more than 1 month arrears. They are not the best company but as long as you make your monthly payment and a bit extra towards the arrears they will be ok. It is best to write to them as they are extremely ruded and aggressive over the phone.

 

Once you have 2 months arrears they start threatening to send a debt councellor round and charge £100 for that!

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I'm with SPML, with the documentation handled by Crapstone, I sent a cheque for last months payment, and said in the letter that I wouldn't have enough for my DD this month, could I send another cheque? No answer so far, but they tried to take the DD. So I'm going to take off the bank charges when I send it, I'm also wondering whether to charge them£25 for the letter! They're quick enough to stick their charges on.

A+L S.A.R - (Subject Access Request) sent 28th July. Statements rec'd 01 Sept. Letter requesting repayment of £4,979 sent 18/09 MCOL sent 15th Nov £6389.57. Cheque received £6425.54 4th Dec.:D

MBNA S.A.R - (Subject Access Request) sent 28th July, promised reply by 28th August. Cheque rec'd £250 31 Aug.:confused: . 2nd letter sent 7 sept for rest of charges to be returned. £243 rec'd 28th Oct:D

CCA sent 1st Credit 11th August, reply 15th Aug

Request for repayment Rooftop Mortgages for £1095, reply saying no on 17th Aug.

Still to come: Cap. One, Time retail, HFC Bank.

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I have cancelled my DD and pay by standing order and i told them that I had to do this due to a pay date change and that I couldn't guarentee payment on the 1st of month but it would be by the 10th and they were fine about it.

 

Without a DD in place they have no control and so long as the payment goes in there is not a lot they can do. They can't put it as arrears as it is being paid regularly and they were informed by phone and in writing so I have proof.

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I have a mortgage with Preferred, being handled by Capstone. I knew one month that a cheque I had paid into my bank would not clear in time to pay the D/D so I cancelled the D/D and sent a cheque the following day. I then re-set the D/D. They advised me that they never received the cheque and a £50 charge was applied. On checking my on-line banking, I noticed that the cheque had been cashed. I contacted them and it was not showing on their system. I eventually had to send them a copy of the bank statement and a copy of the cashed cheque (which cost me £5.00). It never did show on their system, but because I sent them the proof, the payment was honoured and the £50.00 charge withdrawn and the £5.00 for copy of cheque refunded also.

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  • 5 months later...
We are with Capstone and have opted to go into rented accommodation due to their exessive interst rates and arrears charges, we are currently undergoing repossession proceedings after they insisted even though we have a buyer, but there mortgage is taking a little longer to go through

 

We were in exactly the same position. Collosal redemption penalies meant we could not remortgage even though I got a mortgsge with Abbey I could not go through because of the charges meant I would be in negative equity. We walked away from our home and let them have it. We are now in rented accomodation and don't miss owning our own home one bit.

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Thankyou all for your responses.

 

Since I last posted, my friend's marriage has broken up. Her husband left her high and dry and dumped everything in her lap. The house is being repossessed and she is just waiting for a date to vacate it. Her situation is such that she is going to have to declare herself bankrupt.

 

She is now looking for somewhere to rent. I feel really bad because I live so far away from her I can't really do anything practical to help, not even make her a cup of coffee:(

 

The only good thing about it is once she gets her finances sorted out, she can start again - without him weighing her down like a millstone round her neck.

 

I'm going to try and get up to see her within the next few weeks and hopefully by then she'll be a bit more settled.

 

If I ever do decide to buy my little council house, remind me not to use Capstone or any of their subsidiaries!!!

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  • 1 year later...

My brother had a mortgage with SPML via Capstone. Despite the fact that he was suffering from mental health issues caused by stress. They repossessed his home. The following day he took his own life. The property has since been sold and they are now not responding to any phone calls or letters ( sent recorded delivery) regarding the money they are holding. My mother has probate but we get no response. If we phone we get the run around and are eventually cut off, or you get the "yes man", who agrees to send you everything you need just to get you off the phone but has no intention of doing it!

Avoid dealings with this company at all costs!!

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  • 1 month later...

I am currently with a mortgage company called capstone mortgages (previouly preffered mortgages). I am having terrible problems with them and really need some advice as they are treating customers so badly and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

1st problem

To start with in January I recieved a letter from them which said i owed them £888.38 they said it had come from a payment made to them in July 2007 by debit card which not cleared. Bearing in mind this was 2 years ago and that i pay by direct debit anyway this was worrying, to make it worse they were wanting me to pay the outstanding arrears and as it was an unsatisfactory level of arrears if i didnt they were going to start repossesion proceedings.

I had to get all of my paperwork out and the I remebered when I first remortgaged with them my first installment was not for a full months payment and the direct debit was starting in the august so I phoned up to pay the £138.88 to cover the first installment by debit card. On doing this however they debited £888.38 instead appologised and refunded the difference back to me of £719.70 the refunded amount they sent to my direct debit bank details with natwest but I'd paid them with a barclays debit card they appologised for this and i left it at that. Now they were saying that they had this figure outsatning as they had refunded me but the original payment of £888.38 the bank hadnt cleared. They said I had to get proof that i had paid it and it had not been returned from that date in 2007 upto now as it couldve been returned at any time. I had to search through old statments and order copys from both natwest and barclays to prove this at a cost to me.

2nd problem

Then in january I also got a letter to adv that they had taken the direct debit too early and they appolgised and said I wouldnt be charged.(this i think triggered the problem) Then in February on checking my bank statments i noticed that no direct debit was taken from my bank so i called them and they said It was all active checked account numbers etc and then took a payment by card and said dont worry i wouldnt be charged. I was charged a late payment fee but had the direct debit taken payment wouldve been on time. Letters started coming and phonecalls as with the above problem they wanted a payment agreement and said it i didnt have one i would be charged. I agreed to set up an agreement whilst this was getting investigated so that at least it would stop the calls. however in march they didnt req the direct debit again this time i was charged for going againt my credit agreement £80 although again had it taken the payment and had i not had the original problem there would not need to be charges. i wrote and complained sending copys of statements they admited the original problem was there error but as for the 2nd problem they adviced that the bank had recalled the payment (even though i sent proof that no request was showing with bank not that it had been returned and it also showed funds were available). This has continued each month up untill july this year. After calling each month and being told the direct debit was active and not to worry it would go phoning my bank and them telling menothing had gone out i finally cancelled it alltogether and agreed to pay by a debit card instead. I now have arrears due to charges which i am paying off £100 per month based on a long call going through incommings and out goings in the last two month ive done as adv but still been charged and got letters on calling they said i'd defaulted but i havent and on the last payment they said id already paid the £100 and to pay £320.00 not £423 as per agreement which i believe to be wrong so i took his name because we may have another issue as he would only take that as payment this is probably going to cause more charges they just cause problems sit back rub there hands and charge excessively.

Bearing in mind I lost my dad in the may before to cancer he endured for 4 years just prior to this I was already distressed and this just added to it and during the time of waiting for copys of proof with statments and calling them waiting on their responce i even bumped my car. i was receiving debt callers asking for payment and each time they called i was having to explain it all over and i was calling to chase it up also after getting letters with new charges costing me a fortune in mobile bills. Plus its damaged my credit rating so i probably cant move elsewhere now. My finanal response was £75 compensation which doesnt come anywhere near covering it and their charges and they wont budge so i may go to the ombudsman but this can take time. In between im now in arrears and Its funny that 6months before my fixed APR ran out they've done all of this I cant put all this as a note on my credit file and I'm lucky I havent been reposessed its as if they purposely get you in this predicament charge you what they want and enlarge the problem instead of resolving it. I think they need investigating and for others to come forward with issues they have had. :(

 

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Hi fyfey

 

You are not alone as capstone are well known for getting their figures wrong. I had similar problems with them when they claimed i suddenly had arrears.

They took ages to tell where the arrears originated from and even then although they claimed it was from an unpaid dd 2 years earlier they couldn't actually proove it!

 

I wrote countless letters and refused to let them intimidate me. I also asked for a statement of arrears (you should do the same) and went through it with a fine tooth comb but struggled to make sense of it.

 

In the end I went to the FOS who also struggled to understand crapstones statements and I ended up getting all the charges repaid to the account.

 

Hope this helps.

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ps. forgot to say I found the best way to make payments is either over the counter at a Barclays branch (always get and keep receipts) or as I do now by faster payment from my bank account that way I am in control and they can't say something went wrong.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I have had exactly the same problems with this company however,my current solution although not the best for all concerned is going to go bankrupt on them leaving them with a deficit of approx £35,000.They cost me my job through worry,stress and depression.Same scenario with the letters,threats, blah, blah, however, i had the house taken away by reposession eventually however,with currently no job and currently no prospects,who has won in the end?. NOT CRAPSTONE !!!. I feel that they brought it all on themselves and i now have little worry.Perhaps it may cost one of their arrogant,self righteous staff members their position and i say to whoever it may be, GOOD LUCK !!.

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  • 1 month later...

I am looking for any info anyone has on either capstone or preffered mortgages. i am having tremendous problems with these people ie payments going missing, exessive charges, rudeness and general threatening/nasty letters. I have now taken enough from them and have decided to persue this matter through the courts under my company brantwood grange consultants (we deal with consumer problems like this in the utility industry). If anyone has any info which can help me please contact me on [email protected], this can be in the form of your own experiences with preffered/capstone. we want to get as many people together as possible with their experiences with these companies, so we can collect enough info to go to the oft and the government to ask for a full enquiry/investigation into the practices of these companies.

ps. is everyone aware that preffered mortgages were part of the now bankrupt leehman brothers and capstone are still sending out letters on preffered mortgage paperwork.

preffered mortgages have no staff or offices in the uk so how can capstone use their paperwork (surely this must be illegal)

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Hi Brantwood,

Perhaps it would be a good idea to investigate the unscrupulous outfit known as Optima Legal whom are their "legal team".I feel that they are just as bad as their "clients". They attend court with very little or no knowledge of the actual case notes on the offending debtor.When i attended a hearing with them they appeared with not one but three persons,Two in the court room and one in the getaway car!!!!!. Just cause they needed it.I have this inbuilt hatred for persons brave enough to generate literature using company headed paper and signing it simply as "yours, optima legal".This to me is not an official letter and i go looking for a possible "author". Should anyone like the odd address for individuals working for this company, i shall be glad to supply.

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It's a long time since I posted on this thread, so here's what's happening now.

 

My friend had her house repossessed earlier this year and is now living in a council house.

 

She is separated pending a divorce from her husband. He does not work, she does so every debt they ever had has landed in her lap for her to pay off her wages. He's got off Scot Free - so far.

 

I had her on the phone for over an hour tonight. It would seem that Capstone are charging her £32,000 for some "indemnity charge" - whatever that is.

 

Her house was sold after repossession and there was enough capital to cover the mortgage.

 

What this £32,000 indemnity charge is for, without seeing any paperwork, I haven't got a clue. Can anyone shed any light on what this might be - and more to the point, is it legal?

 

It would seem that she and her husband took out a remortgage in the region of £35,000 so if this £32,000 is something to do with that, it seems more than a bit excessive to me, but again, without seeing paperwork I'm floundering around in the dark.

 

She did go to the CAB 2 months ago and was told she would have to pay this £32,000 (I would query that - I might be wrong but I felt she was given bad advice). Capstone wanted her to set up a DD for the monthly amount of £62, which, on the "advice" of the CAB, she did. I felt that was a bad move as she doesn't know herself what this is for.

 

Her husband doesn't pay one single penny towards any of the debt - even though his gambling addiction got them into this mess in the first place.

 

I asked her if she has copies of what she originally signed for and if so, to photocopy them and send them to me so I can read them myself - and also this "indemnity" demand.

 

I think she should go to the FOS with everything she has from Capstone and start fighting back. At the moment she is sick with worry, can't sleep etc.

 

So far she has managed to stave off bankruptcy but I wonder if she would be better to declare herself bankrupt - that way Capstone wouldn't get much out of her - if anything - serve them right! What is stopping her doing that is that she's afraid she'll lose her car (just a small car, nothing special) and she needs it to get to and from work.

 

I am toying with the idea of going up to see her, not this weekend but next but my own financial position is tight and it's an 800 mile round trip.

 

What really irks me is it was her husband who got her in this mess in the first place with his compulsive gambling yet he's getting away with not paying anything towards the debts that he incurred. He kept the debts secret from her for years until they caught up with him in the form of a couple of "heavies" banging on her door!

 

She also has credit card debts - due to him taking and using her credit cards without her permission a few years ago. He's also forged her signature on more than one occasion.

 

She's in a real mess financially and I wish I could do more to help get her sorted out.

 

If anyone can give advice on getting this sorted out, I'm sure she'd be very grateful.

 

Just in case anyone thinks this is about me - no it isn't. This is about my friend. Just wish we lived closer to each other - at least I'd be able to go through her paperwork with her and give a clearer picture of what's happening.

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Hi

 

I think she needs to send cappstone a SAR and ask for all the info on the sale of the house with a complete breakdown of the fees attached to this.

 

As you say with so much debt she may be better off going bankrupt but I am sure someone else with more knowledge will be along soon.

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moonrose re your friend.

If she no longer owns anything bankruptcy is a serious option,she will be discharged after a year and if her car is old they won,t take it off her if its not worth selling.Depends really what her actual assets are.ie tv's etc what sort of job etc it would be worth her seeing the cab,if she makes herself bankrupt its about a £400 fee I think

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Thanks Midge61 and Ryde.

 

Her car is one of the new style Micras but I'm not sure exactly how old it is. As for TV, she just has a second-hand ordinary one as far as I know. Everything else she has she bought second-hand or was given to help furnish her house so I doubt she has anything that would really be of value.

 

It would seem that her ex-husband took all the paperwork so I told her to try and get the paperwork from him. She has his phone number so phoned him.

 

Surprise, surprise, he's destroyed ALL the paperwork relating to any loans, mortgages, bank statements (joint account) they had so it looks like she'll have to do a SAR.

 

She suspects he may have forged her signature more than once to get money.

 

She is working tonight - she is some kind of carer for handicapped people who are living independently with help. This is when we usually talk over the phone as she doesn't have a landline at home so I'll have a better picture of what's going on when I've spoken to her later tonight.

 

Seems to me her ex is deliberately landing her with all the debt and doing his best to be obstructive (I wonder why!!!).

 

As she doesn't have access to a PC it will be me who will draft any letters for her, then send them to her to read, sign or amend.

 

It was interesting to read on another thread about SPML's "difficulties". It will be even more interesting to read the outcome of what happens to these sharks operating under Capstone's umbrella.

 

I read out some of the posts to her the other day and to say she was gobsmacked was an understatement!

 

Some might think why am I bothering with this. She has been my friend for many years and has always been there for me through times of strife (in my case mainly serious illness in my family - now, happily everyone's fine). She is more like the sister I never had than a friend and I really hate to see her distressed and worried like she is. She didn't deserve what she got and if I can help her in any way.

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