Workout Options
If you are facing financial difficulties, there are a number of different options available which may help you to meet your mortgage payments.
Engage Credit assesses every customer's individual circumstances and the workout strategies available may not be suitable for everyone. Engage Credit reserves the right not to offer any/all of the workouts strategies to you if it does not feel they are appropriate to your situation.
Engage Credit is committed to working with borrowers who are experiencing payment difficulties, but where we are unable to offer a viable and appropriate alternative we reserve the right to pursue litigation and repossession in order to recover our debt.
Payment arrangements
Our preferred method of addressing payment difficulties is to work with you to assess your financial situation and affordability and agree a formal payment arrangement with you that will clear the arrears over a suitable timeframe.
Payment arrangements typically involve you paying off your arrears month by month whilst keeping up with your contractual payments. For example, if your usual monthly payment is £500 and you have missed two previous payments (2 x £500 = £1,000) then, subject to an affordability assessment and analysis of your situation, we might agree for you to pay your usual payment of £500 plus an extra £50 each month. This would clear the arrears over 20 months.
Concessionary Arrangements
In special circumstances Engage Credit may also consider concessionary arrangements which would involve a temporary short term discount to your existing payments. For example, if you suffered a temporary financial difficulty such as being unable to work through injury, Engage Credit might consider accepting less than the £500 contractual payment each month until you recovered, followed by a normal payment arrangement after that to catch up.
In all cases Engage Credit will base any arrangement on the individual circumstances of each case. Where we deem an arrangement to be an unsuitable method of addressing the payment difficulties, Engage Credit reserves the right to take alternative action.
Modifications
In some circumstances Engage Credit may consider a temporary, or occasionally a permanent, variation to the structure of mortgage loans to assist borrowers who are experiencing payment difficulties.
As with concessionary arrangements, Engage Credit will base any arrangement on the individual circumstances of each case. Where we deem a modification to be an unsuitable method of addressing the payment difficulties, Engage Credit reserves the right to take alternative action.
Simple modifications may involve extending the term of your mortgage which has the effect of reducing your monthly payment if you are paying Capital and Interest (it has no effect on Interest Only mortgages). Alternatively we can consider switching your loan from Capital and Interest to Interest Only temporarily in order to reduce your monthly payment.
Other modifications may involve altering the structure of your loan more fundamentally. For example, we can consider temporary interest rate changes, temporary fixed payment amounts and capitalisation of your arrears.
Any such modification will be carefully assessed by our specially trained Workout Options staff and Engage reserves the right not to offer any or all of the Workout Options based on its perception of the risk involved and the suitability of each Workout Option to the case in question.
Loan Exit Strategies
If you no longer wish to retain your mortgage, we are happy to discuss the possible options available to you. Our specialist staff are able to consider all offers for final repayment, even where the balance available is not sufficient to clear the mortgage in full.
We strongly suggest that you take independent professional advice before considering any mortgage exit option. Please click here for details of independent advice providers.
Short Sales - If you want to sell your property but you do not think the sale proceeds will be sufficient to redeem your loan in full, Engage Credit may be willing, in some circumstances, to consider agreeing instalment payments to repay the shortfall overtime or even forgiving a portion of the shortfall. Engage Credit is under no obligation to entertain short sales and all customers remain jointly and severally liable for the entire debt unless specifically informed otherwise.
Assisted Sales - If you want to sell your property but you do not know how, or are unwilling to deal with the sale process, Engage Credit may consider assisting your sale by offering to appoint and manage estate agents, evaluate offers and oversee the conveyancing process in conjunction with you. Engage Credit is under no obligation to entertain assisted sales and all customers remain jointly and severally liable for the entire debt unless specifically informed otherwise.
Voluntary Surrender - If you no longer wish to retain the property and have no interest in being involved in the sales process, you can voluntarily surrender the property to us. Please call our Credit Management team on 0333 014 2046 if you are considering this course of action.