First, I echo everything Mr. Byrne said. It all sounds familiar to me. I have a similar story. Obviously, it is slightly different because everyone is different. The story goes the same way.
Our mortgage was sold without our consent. By the time we found out about it, I would imagine it was too late. Nonetheless, we wrote to it. We objected. We asked it not to do it. We had, obviously, an idea of how we wanted to sort this out and it was much like Mr. Byrne said.
We had entered into a split-mortgage arrangement with the same bank and we were, since the day we made the arrangement, paying every single penny it asked us for. To this day, we have never been a day late, even during the pandemic. We have never asked for a break. We have never asked for anything. We just picked up, as Mr. Byrne said, where we left off with the bank when the vulture fund took over.
As for how we got here, I was probably the main earner and I lost my job. That, obviously, affected our ability to pay and resulted in arrears which, through dealing with our bank, we sorted out. It came to us and offered us the split mortgage. It was not our idea. It came to us through the Money Advice & Budgeting Service, MABS. We had been dealing with MABS, and that is how we got the split mortgage. We were always prepared to pay it. There was never to be a day where we were to say that we will park that, that is grand and we do not need to bother. We want to own our home. We took out a mortgage because we wanted to own our home. That is not unreasonable. It is very reasonable.
It has taken its toll on us as a family. Similar to Mr. Byrne, I have never taken my children on a holiday. My eldest boy is ten and we have never been able to take him on a holiday because we prioritised paying our mortgage and keeping a roof over their heads. Frankly, that is more important.
We were assured when the mortgage was sold on that every condition we had arranged with our bank would continue because we had just signed up to another arrangement that would have seen us out to the point where I could have gone back to work which was the whole idea and then we would go back to the full payments. As I said, we had a plan.
Within, I would say, a month of it being transferred, we were getting letters stating that it needed us to fill out the standard financial statements. We had done that for the bank but these were different. These were not the same. The people might have been lovely to talk to on the phone but there was always an element of "We are watching you". I used to get the bank statements that we would send to them, get a Sharpie and block out anything that I thought it might take issue with. For example, if I took my children to a drive-through, I would feel like I could not let them see that. That is wrong. I cannot begin to explain what that feels like.
As I said, we have never defaulted since the day we got our arrangement with the bank and we have not defaulted since we have been moved to the vulture fund. I would just love to know what was the criteria. My question always is, who decided my loan that I was meeting the terms and conditions of and the arrangement that it proposed to us and came to us about was suddenly not good enough? It was the one who said that it would agree this amount, that we could pay that and that would cover us until we could go back to full payments, which, as I said, was always our aim. Who decided that was not acceptable? Where was the Central Bank when all of this was happening?
I am so glad that this is being talked about now because, believe me, the last place I want to be is sitting here talking about something that is very personal and very private. However, I feel that the only way we will ever move forward with this is if people, such as me, speak up and say, "Yes, I am that person." I sat in a room this morning with my four-year-old who was having his graduation from preschool. I looked around the room and I said to myself that there is a good chance at least one other person in the room is in the same circumstances as me but they are ashamed. They are ashamed and they have no need to be because they have done nothing wrong.
Since the day we signed up to a split mortgage and our payments, we have done nothing out of place. We have met every interest rate. As Mr. Byrne said, it has now shot up to 7.25%. I wrote to them because we want to draw down more of the warehouse account. We did last year and our plan was to do more again this year. As I said, it was always the track for us.
It will not fix a rate. It will not look at anything like that for us because I now believe it is trying to prevent us from drawing down any more of the warehouse account. I do not know why. I genuinely do not know. All I know is that my interest rates have gone to the point where, if you include the additional ESB costs, cost of living costs and the additional mortgage costs, we are definitely down anywhere between €800 and €900 per month with three children, the eldest of whom is ten.
I work part time because we do not have family local to us. I do not have a grandmother, or an auntie or a sister, or a cousin living down the road where I can say, "Mind my children", "Can you collect them?" or "Can you go and get them?" I cannot do that. I do not have that option and I must do it myself.
My husband leaves the house at 5.25 a.m. to go to work. That is a crazy hour to be leaving the house. His alarm goes off at 4.50 a.m. and he is out the door at 5.25 a.m. to make sure we can pay our bills and keep the roof over our heads, and we intend to do that.
I spoke to a mortgage consultant who I had dealings with previously and he calculated for me that if we continue paying the interest rate that we are currently paying versus a normal rate, we were looking at a difference of €48,000. That is how much extra the interest will cost us with a vulture fund versus the standard retail banks. That is a significant amount of money. That would pay half of my warehouse account - give or take. It is just an inconceivable amount of money.
As I said, in relation to the impact on the family, we cannot go the places we want to go. My children now want to go to rugby camp in a couple of weeks and I do not know if I can send them. I have a young fellow who thinks he is the next Peter O'Mahony. Quite frankly, he has the attitude, and he could be, but yet again I have to say to him that he cannot go to something or do something because I am watching every single penny that goes in and out of this house. As I said, we had hoped to take them on a holiday this year but, with the interest rates the way they are, that is just not going to happen.
To wrap up what I have to say, we did not deserve to be sold down the river the way we were by our bank. Let us call a spade a spade. That is what it was. We do not deserve to be ripped off by a vulture fund, which is what is happening. We can do nothing about it.
We are totally trapped with it.
It will not let us draw down any more of the warehouse account unless the interest rate drops. What is to say it will even drop the interest rates when the Central Bank starts to drop them? It will eventually because these things are all cyclical. They go up and then they come back down again. I understand that. Will the funds pass that on? That is the question and what I do not understand. As I said, I have tried to ask the fund to reduce its interest rates and it has outright refused to discuss it. It will tell me nothing about the mortgage I am paying. It is our money and the fund will not tell me where it is going. I cannot go down the route of insolvency because we are not in arrears. That is only of use to somebody who is in arrears and I will not go into arrears just so I can access that. That is just not a viable option and I am not prepared to do it.
We are consistently punished because we did the right thing. We fill out the forms, go to the meetings, take the phone calls, and do the stupid statements that are one of the most invasive and intrusive things I have ever come across. That is a fact. To think that I should not spend a fiver on a coffee in case the fund says I did not need that and could have had it at home. One cannot help but feel that is how the fund is thinking when looking at these. That is pretty much it for me. If members have any questions afterwards, I will be happy to answer them as best I can. It is a very similar story to Jimmy's, which the committee just heard. We are stuck just as he was. I thank the committee.
