FTB - has anyone had any issues with Santander?

Hi All,

Need to let off some steam in a place where some people might understand or tell me to wise up!

We have an AiP agreed with Santander for the full amount we need to purchase a house we’ve reserved (£252k) and submitted a full mortgage application on 12/03. They undertook hard credit searches on 12/03 and booked a valuation on 23/03. Everything has gone fine but it seems they only began to underwrite the application after the valuation, so time has been lost. They have raised queries and seem to be reducing the offer with each query, despite being satisfactorily answered.

For example - I forgot to include a card with a £400 balance, but out of the credit commitments I had declared, these have reduced by £1200 in the same month (still a net decrease in debt) yet they can’t seem to bring themselves to offer the full AiP amount.

Pair this with an unengaging and unresponsive broker, who sits with underwriter queries for days, and only tells us half of the things they’ve asked for. We normally provide information/clarification within the hour of being asked, however it’s usually not reviewed or passed back to the underwriters until some days later.

We’re now at the point where we’re going to lose the reservation on the house, the reservation fee and be liable for legal fees incurred so far and all we’ve got to show for it a hard credit search on our report that’ll flag up on any future applications.

The whole process started exciting but it’s become quite disheartening now. All of our friends and family told us to get rid of the mortgage broker, as they have some pretty fatal flaws in their work ethic and customer service skills, but with 4 days left until we lose the reservation it seems pointless to switch now.

Edit:

Joint salary is £82k, property value is £265,995, 5% deposit and total debts are around £22k (mainly relating to car finance). Monthly outgoings are around £1.2k.