On this page you will find information for homeowners about emergency loans, planning, rubbish and recycling and grants and loans from Lewisham Council website and Citizens Advice.
How to sort out your mortgage problems
If you’re having problems paying your mortgage, you must take action quickly to stop yourself from falling into debt. If you get into debt and your lender thinks you’re not dealing with the problem, they will take action through the courts. This could lead to you losing your home. Find out about some of the options you may have for sorting out your mortgage problems and how to deal with your lender.
Managing your mortgage
Even if you’re not struggling to pay your mortgage, you’ll want to make sure you stay in control of your payments and not run into trouble.
Advice from Citizens Advice:
- how to plan your budget so that you can manage your mortgage
- how to deal with increases in your mortgage payments or a drop in your income
- how to get the best mortgage deal available
- what to do if you start to get into difficulties.
Remember that you can lose your home if you don’t keep up repayments on your mortgage.
What happens when your mortgage lender takes you to court? Eviction for mortgage arrears
If you are in mortgage arrears, your mortgage lender will want you to clear them. If you don’t do this, your mortgage lender will start court action. This is called possession action and could lead to you losing your home.
You might be able to stop the case from going to court by negotiating an arrangement with your lender.
Even if it’s not possible to stop the case from going to court, this doesn’t necessarily mean that you will lose your home.
The court might agree to grant a suspended possession order. This will allow you to stay in your home as long as you keep to an arrangement to pay off the arrears.
You might be able to argue that your lender has acted unfairly or unreasonably, or has not followed the proper procedures. This could help to get court action delayed or persuade the judge to issue a suspended possession order instead of negotiating an arrangement with your lender which could lead to you being evicted from your home.
The important things to remember are:
- it’s almost never too late to try and come to an agreement with your lender
- you can get free help and advice to deal with a claim for mortgage arrears
- if there’s a court hearing, make sure you go to it – it may be the last chance you get to stop you from losing your home
Eviction for mortgage arrears
If you’re in mortgage arrears, your mortgage lender will want you to clear them.
If you aren’t able to clear them, your lender will try to get you evicted from your home. This is called taking possession. It allows them to sell your property and use the money from the sale to help pay off the debt.
