A while ago, I posted a question regarding Nationwide, a Mortgage taken out in 1989 which I have at the moment no paperwork for.

I remember taking out a 100% mortgage at a fixed rate, and in the first year paying an extra 10% (about £430) for a policy which would pay the Nationwide in the event of repossesion. He used terms like " If you were to vandalise the place, we would be covered" Now this seems like the MIG that you all discuss, but I haven't got proof, and Eversheds state that there was no such policy, only an "extra payment during the first year" which they did not elaborate on. When I do a search on data protection, if I mentioned the address I was at when I bought the property in 1989, would they supply the mortgage details? I would appreciate any feedback, or ideas to get this info.

Rob

-- rob dodd (robdodd2@dialstart.net), December 01, 2000

Answers

Rob: in 1989 MIG's were around and you most certainly paid for one if you had a 100% mortgage. The Nationwide would not issue a mortgage over 75% of the value of a property without one, either then or now. Follow the advice on this forum and get copies of the Mortgage agreement and the breakdown of the fees you paid when you took out the mortgage. You can get them from the Lender. Buried in the completion statement is the MIG payment. It was usually tacked onto the mortgage balance (thereby costing thousands in the long run). Eversheds should be ashamed of themselves for suggesting otherwise.

-- Too scared to say (iwasduped@yahoo.com), December 01, 2000.

The solicitor who handled the conveyancing for you ought to be able to help you out with this. Get on to the solicitors straight away and ask them for a copy of your file - they will probably keep this stuff for 12 years so you should just be in time. In fact why not ask them outright how much you paid for your MIG? They might be keener to answer a question as simple as this rather than have to photocopy a whole file. (But ask them to hang on to your file for you.) You must have been sold a MIG on a 100% mortgage.

Some building societies in the late 80s/early 90s asked for one-off payments to cover MIGs. If this was the case, then your solicitor's invoice (the part with the completion statement) for conveyancing ought to give you a way to work out the amount paid for the MIG (and thus prove that you had one) when you took out the mortgage. If you don't have a copy, ask the solicitor who did the conveyancing. The invoice will say how much the property cost ('purchase price'). It will say how much deposit you paid ('received from you'). Deduct the deposit from the purchase price. This leaves the amount of the mortgage, and this is what the lender should have advanced to you if there were really no MIG. But is this figure actually less than it should be? If so, and the sum is headed 'mortgage advance (net)', then the difference between the two amounts (i.e. the amount the mortgage advance should be, and the amount under 'mortgage advance (net)') is very probably the sum deducted for the MIG.

-- Eleanor Scott (eleanor.scott@btinternet.com), December 02, 2000.