Consumer complaint received 2021-08-02
Company: Long & Foster Financial Services, Inc.
State: VT
Product: Mortgage
Sub-product: Conventional home mortgage
Issue: Closing on a mortgage

Complaint:
In XX/XX/2021 our buying agent suggested we contact XXXX XXXX, Mortgage Consultant. We were in the process of purchasing a home in North Carolina. XXXX was very helpful in the preapproval process. He called to let me know that we were preapproved. We did not get a formal approval letter. At that time, I asked if we needed to sell our current home first. He said we did not. We had a set preapproved amount to stay under. In XXXX, we wanted to bid on a house which was higher than our preapproved amount. XXXX called me and asked if we were going to sell our current house. I said that was the plan. We werent planning on owning two houses. All he said was if we got that house, we would have to show our current house as being listed for sale. During the two months we were part of the house bidding wars, XXXX was very helpful. He was very reassuring and answered all my questions. 

Unfortunately, the morning after we signed a purchase agreement for a house in North Carolina, which include {$30000.00} for due diligence, all that changed. XXXX told me he miscalculated and we would need to close on our current house before closing on our NC house. I tried to share with him that that would be impossible because closings in our state were taking 8 weeks or more to happen. What this meant for us was that we could lose our {$30000.00} DD deposit and NC house if we couldnt close our current house first. There arent lots of appraisers and big banks in our small state. He said there wasnt anything he could do. When I asked him why he didnt tell us that sooner. He responded that I should have known that because he would ask how it was going listing our current house. At no point during the preapproval process did he share this very important piece of information. 

Our nightmare of working with XXXX began that day, went for 45 days, and didnt end until 2 hours before our closing. During those 45 days XXXX miscalculated multiple items. As a bookkeeper, I would create spreadsheets and share supporting information to show him how his calculations of some of his numbers was incorrect. He never responded, however, at the end of the 45 days he did use my corrected numbers for his final calculations. 

During that time, I came up with a way we could remove the need to close on our current house before closing on our NC house. XXXX approved it. Unfortunately, he didnt ask how I was going to do it until a few days before our closing. Then his referred to a XXXX XXXX ruling saying we couldnt do it, however, when I looked up the rules it clearly said we could. I sent it to XXXX, but he didnt response and admit he was wrong. 

The thing I dont understand is that in the end he ended up using the same numbers from our preapproval without saying we needed to close on our current house first. 
Of course, at no point during the 45 days, did he actually say he was wrong about anything. We started the process in XXXX. Because of his constant errors we didnt get final approval until 2 hours before our NC closing. It shouldnt have taken 3 months to get final approval. It was a living nightmare working with XXXX XXXX!!

Company response to consumer: Closed with monetary relief