The Lemon Fool

When an offer on a house has been accepted, agents immediately wish to confirm the purchaser has sufficient funds, both mortgage and savings.

If parents are making a contribution to the deposit of one of their children, is it usual for them to provide proof, or is it more likely that they will have to transfer funds to the child at an early stage so that proof is in the child’s name? It would be helpful to know what is generally accepted practice.

MyNameIsUrl wrote:When an offer on a house has been accepted, agents immediately wish to confirm the purchaser has sufficient funds, both mortgage and savings.

If parents are making a contribution to the deposit of one of their children, is it usual for them to provide proof, or is it more likely that they will have to transfer funds to the child at an early stage so that proof is in the child’s name? It would be helpful to know what is generally accepted practice.

I helped both my sons buy their first property in this way, and in fact a letter from me stating that the transfer of funds was an unconditional gift was required by the mortgage lenders to my sons. Presumably those lenders wanted proof that my sons were not borrowing the deposit as well as the mortgage itself.

That letter was considered adequate proof.

The other thing I did was transfer the funds early on in the process, so that everyone know the monies were there and available. It seemed to me that was better than waiting until the last minute, and it was surely helpful that the boys could show anyone who cared that the money had been in their accounts for several months.

Not sure about "generally accepted practice" but in my case my son told the estate agent and then the solicitor that I would be providing £x. They both, in their own time, contacted me to confirm which I did and in the case of the solicitor I had to "prove" that the funds met anti-money laundering conditions.

No pressure on me to pay over the funds until very shortly before deposit/completion.

Hi,

Similar 'problem'. According to the Agent I would have to travel to Norwich to sign something at their solicitors. We live in Birmingham. Decided, as it was only £3,000 to top up the deposit, to just transfer the money to our son in advance. Then there was no problem. Might have taken a different route if it had been a large sum.

Cheers,
Ray

same here, did this today in fact, needed to get a solicitor to provide certified copy of identity and address, and evidence of where the money came from (I could have gone to the estate agent but that's a long way away)

at £20 a signature for 2 documents it didn't sting too much, but was only 10 minutes work