Applying for a mortgage. Can anyone offer any help or advice please ?

[Helen.79]

Hi All, I am looking for some advice. The last payment for my IVA was Jan 2012 but due to the VAT issues my completion date wasn;t till June 2012. Does this mean that it won;t drop off my credit file till June 2013? It seems a little unfair and as my Husband & I are looking to buy our first house I am keen to re-build my credit rating as soon as pssible & I don't want to have to wait till June 2013 to apply for a normal rate mortgage. Can anyone offer me any help or advice please? Thank you.

[Niobe]

Hi and welcome.

It should drop off six years from the date of acceptance provided you have had your completion letter.

If you're looking at a mortgage then I would recommend that you have a chat with our resident mortgage expert Ryan whose contact details can be found under the Ask experts a question link on the lefthand side of the page. He has helped several posters out.

[luluj]

Echo Niobe's advice....give Ryan a call and take some advice...everyone's circumstances are different and advice from a professional is the way forward.

[TheMatrix]

You will get asked the question "Have you ever entered an arrangement with creditors" You should answer Yes, even though all the details would have been wiped from the Credit Reference Agencies.

This in my opinion is going to have a negative affect on what lenders would be prepared to lend you and at what rate. We're basically doomed for as long as they are allowed to ask that question from getting "a normal rate mortgage". or certainly anything competitive.

Also some lenders do not consider you at all, even after completion when the file is clear, and require that the IVA is cleared for anywhere between 1-6 years. Some never will accept an application from anyone having entered a IVA.

A whole of market broker may help, but still suspect that the rate will not be as good as if you never had a IVA. Guess if you want a mortgage we'll just have to put up with the higher rates

[Tonto]

As said above, it will drop of your credit file six years after you initially entered it/it was accepted. However, Experian do not remove it from the credit file until you send the completion certificate to them. Also, you may find that some of the creditors added defaults some time after the IVA was entered into. These will fall off six years after the default date and so it is good to clear these up by writing to the creditors and asking them to update the credit agencies.

My six year IVA anniversary was in July just gone but I had defaults on that wouldn't fall off until this December. It's taken three months to clear up but I now have perfect credit scores with all three agencies. Perfect credit scores means more likely to get a mortgage, of course there is still the 'have you ever' question mentioned above and how you answer that is down to your own 'ethics' I guess. Also, it's likely that your creditors will keep their own internal records of the debt for well after six years and so a mortgage with them, ever, might be unlikely.

[TheMatrix]

Experian should have had details of the completion from the insolvency service, sometimes it gets missed in which case as pointed out above you'd need to send them a completion certificate so that it can be marked as completed ready for its removal at 6 years and a day.

A mortgage with a ex-creditor is very unlikely, but may be not impossible after time. Who knows what their future lending criteria is going to be like.

Ethics comes into it, so does a CIFAS marker potentially if you lie on a mortgage application. That has a load of ramifications behind it, least of all getting any kind of bank account in future. Is it really worth it?

[Niobe]

Credit scores don't mean anything as lenders tend to use their own criteria these days.

I'm afraid that as far as mortgages go, you will have to put up with a higher interest rate which is why a chat with Ryan will help.

[TheMatrix]

Agree with the Niobe's assessment on "Credit Scores", the only useful information from the CRA's is the data they hold re how you've handled your accounts past and present. This information is used by the lender to "score" you using their own scoring systems.

The random number generators produced by the CRA's are definitely not worth paying for.

[sponge]

For example, in 2007 it was possible for a person in an IVA to find several mortgage lenders prepared to lend up to 85% of the value of the property they were intending to buy, meaning a relatively small deposit of 15% was needed. But, at present, the minimum deposit demanded by mortgage lenders for someone in an IVA is 50% of the value of the property.

Took the above from the net

Absolutely credit scores are just made up by the CRA's to sell to you. Lenders do not see the CRA's credit score they have given you.

I don’t believe there’s anything to fix it’s either good or bad. It’s bad with defaults and an IVA on public record. It’s good when you have no IVA on public record, no defaults and the winning bit a current account with no overdraft you get a lot of green ticks over the months n years. And no searches bar insurance.

Now that’s what their looking – History. My sixth year was up a few weeks ago and all CRA’s cleared within a week with a bit of input from me. Experian go on to tell me why I am such a good lending bet

Me I’d wait for that six years or however long it takes (a pain I know) and if I was asked have I ever entered in agreement with your creditors, why blight myself forever. I know but in the eyes of the law that debt evaporated as if it had never existed post six years, or else why remove it from your credit record. I mean even if the lender did somehow find out, big cheese just put your stupid hat on I is a bit fikky. I doubt there’s much they can or actually will do.

[sponge]

they're!