Mortgage Arrears Advice and Repossessions

Mortgage Arrears Advice

For many families, the cost of running a home has become increasingly difficult.

If your mortgage is becoming unmanageable, you should act quickly to contact your lender, seek debt advice and also contact the Housing Options Team at Wealden District Council. You should also read the National Homelessness Advice Service (NHAS) leaflet on mortgage issues, which sets out the options available to you. Lenders can offer options ranging from agreeing to change the length of your loan to payment breaks.

There are other ways to help you stay in your home, such as Income Support Mortgage Interest (ISMI) available through the Department of Work and Pensions and other housing options which can be discussed with you.

There are various charitable organisations that can offer you free debt advice such as Citizen's Advice Bureau, National Debtline or Consumer Credit Counselling Service.

Mortgage Rescue Scheme

From January 2009 The Government introduced further assistance to help families with children and vulnerable households that have fallen into mortgage arrears under the Mortgage Rescue Scheme.

When you contact the Housing Options Team we will discuss whether the Mortgage Rescue Scheme is suitable for you, depending on your circumstances. We can also discuss alternative housing options for you to chose the best option for you and your household.

Under the government's Mortgage Rescue Scheme there are two products that may be offered to you:

Shared Equity Scheme - enables people to sell part of their property to a Registered Social Landlord. You pay rent on the share you have sold, therefore reducing the monthly outgoings to an affordable level. The option remains to buy the share back in the future. This option is open to people with between 25% - 40% equity.
Government Mortgage to Rent Scheme allows people to sell their property to a Registered Social Landlord and then rent it back under an Assured Shorthold Tenancy, at an affordable rent. Under this scheme there is no automatic option to buy the property back. This is for people with less than 25% equity but no less than 120% negative equity (e.g. if your property is worth £100,000 your mortgage cannot be more than £120,000 for you to be eligible).

In all cases act as soon as you think that you may be facing problems. Criteria apply to the Mortgage Rescue Schemes and not all households will be eligible so it is important that you discuss your circumstances with a Housing Options Officer as soon as possible.

Homeowner Mortgage Support

Homeowner Mortgage Support (HMS) is an additional mortgage support tool for homeowners experiencing a temporary drop in income. For example, if you had two part-time jobs but lost one of them, experienced a drop in hours or overtime or if you or your partner have lost your job and your household now relies on one income.

The scheme involves part of the interest payments on the mortgage being delayed. The mortgage must be changed to an interest-only mortgage and the homeowner must be able to meet at least 30% of the interest payments. The scheme is available for up to two years. The interest that is not paid during that period is added to the total loan. Homeowners should be satisfied that they could meet the increased payments after the two year period.

Households interested in the scheme should contact their lender to find out if the scheme is offered and whether it is the right option for them. Further advice can be obtained from the Council's Housing Options Team on 01323 443322. You can also read the CLG Mortgage Leaflet (pdf, 756kb) leaflet for more information.