Mortgage plan is my business

QMy building society has written to say I must tell them how I will pay back my interest- only mortgage, which is due to end in December 2018. Do I have to give them any information? Surely it’s my business?

ASince the banking sector meltdown of recent years, the financial regulators want banks to ensure that they are not lending to people who cannot pay the money back.

You do not have to tell your lender how you intend to repay your loan but having said that you should really have a practical plan in place.

You can ignore threats from your lender to forcibly switch you to a loan on a capital repayment basis, as this could be construed as not treating customers fairly but don’t overlook the sentiment behind finding out if you can pay.

Your lender is naturally looking after its own interests and wants its money back. It is also, however, looking after yours and if you do not have a repayment vehicle it may be able to offer suggestions from remortgaging to a different deal or even extending the term.

Neither you nor the building society want to see you out on the street as a result of repossession.

If you end up not being able to pay off the capital you may need to consider downsizing, equity release or moving into rented accommodation.

QMy wife and I are in our late 80s and currently live in a residential care home. We have a joint savings bond and if one of us dies, the balance of the account goes automatically to the survivor.

We have it in mind to declare that we are holding the account as tenants- in- common, so that the balance would be divided equally between the survivor and the estate of the deceased.

However, we have been reminded by the bank and told that its terms permit only joint tenants and the declaration would be ignored by them.

Would I be right in thinking that, while suppliers may be legally e n t i t l e d t o allocate the total balance to the survivor, the declaration itself would none the less remain valid and still provide legal authority for executors of the deceased to claim half of the balance from the survivor?

AYes, you are quite right in thinking this. Precedent was set in a ruling by Mr Justice Richards in a case decided on June 22, 2010 in the Liverpool court, in the case of Re v the Estate of Edith Mary Northall Deceased. You should draw up a document signed by both parties and lodge it with your solicitor or whoever keeps your will, to make it plain that you do not consider the money in the joint account to be the property of the other party when you die.

Usually the deceased has intended that the surviving joint account holder should have access to any money remaining in a joint account. However, where such an account has been purposefully set up for administrative convenience, say for example, a son administering his invalid mother’s affairs or flatmates sharing a joint account to pay their bills, that makes it possible to define who owns which particular shares.

QWhen writing my will in 2004 I intended to put in about £ 30,000 to be divided between my two grandchildren.

Later, though, I decided to invest that sum in the hope that when they were 21 there would be a nice little nest egg for them. The name of the investment I chose is Barclays Balanced Portfolio A.

At first it did grow but now it is fluctuating between growth and falling below the level of my original investment. In my last statement I can see that there was a gain of £ 1,577. Do you think I should take my money out?

It does worry me considerably that my grandchildren, with the current state of the economy, could end up with far less than I originally invested.

AJonathan Hill, a certified financial planner at Milford and Dormor, solicitors in Chard, Somerset says: “As far as that fund is concerned, I would not hold it and nor would I even recommend it, which probably sums up fairly well my feelings on its investment value.

“Having said that, this does not necessarily mean that you should switch.

“The important factor here is to make sure that you talk over and consider all of your feelings and objectives.

“I would suggest that you set up and initial meeting with a feebased certified or chartered adviser to discuss in detail your wider aims for this money.”