Bought ex out mortgage co refuse to remove name

I was officially divorced in may 2009 & seperated in dec 07. The family home was on the market from dec 07 until summer 2011. It was a coirt order that it be sold.The house didnt sell & so my ex wife asked if i could buy her half of the equity. After a lot of tooing & frooing i bought her half out in aug '11 & moved in. Our solicitors made everything legal & i signed to indemnify her against the mortgage & her to have no further interest in the house & to remove her name off the mortgage. I re married in 2010 & live in the house with my new wife & pay the mortgage. The problem is that santander refuse to remove my ex's name from the mortgage! When i very 1st got the mortgage with my ex wife, her income was not taken into account as she did not work (& now just works in a shop & if it came to it she could not afford to pay this mortgage as it is £580k) i have paid my ex wife off & have sent pages of solicitors documents to santander to justify why she should be removed & that she has moved out. I have life ins policy that would cover the mortgage upon my death (my new wife being the beneficiary of this money) but obviuosly my new wife is very stressed out about this situation as she would be in a strange situation & would not want to pay off the mortgage if the house was given to my ex especially after paying her off. The mortgage advisor has told us we will have to go down the complaints route. This seems totally ludicous situation. We are worried what would happen if i died or when we want to sell the house.can anyone give any advice at all? Thanks so much

welcome to wiki.

One thing is not clear. Have you actually completed the TR1 transfer of equity that would put just your name on the deeds?

If the house is in your sole name your ex would have no claim on it - even if she has to remain on the mortgage. Unfortunately you cannot force a lender to remove someone from the mortgage. They have to be satisfied that you alone meet their current lending criteria and it is possible these have been tightened up in the current financial climate.

Hadenoughnow

Hi, thanks so much. No not done a TR1 form (I dont think but will double check now you have said!), so i can do the TR1 form to remove her from the deed, but not the mortgage then? I can do this without santanders approval?

i cannot understand the bank. I earn more then enough to pay the mortgage (& be approved for the amount too)& my ex has no assets what soever, just her job & what i give her in maintainence (Incl child maintainence its £3k pm - 4 kids!)

so if i die & my new wife recives the benefit of the life insurance & pays off the mortgage (& i alter my will to make her the beneficary of this house)my ex wife cannot claim half despite her name being on the mortgage, if her name is removed from the deed via the TR1 form?

Also do you have any idea what i will have to do if i wish to sell the house in a few years?
thank you again for your time, much appreciated

If the house is on your name (via TR1) and there is no charge registered against it by her then there is nothing to stop you selling. The only tricky bit will be if you want to make changes to the mortgage because you will need both signatures - ie if you wanted to change to interest only. TBH it is in her interests that you get her off the mortgage because as it stands, if you were to default, she would be chased for the debt - and she has no interest in the asset against which the loan is secured.

Hadenoughnow

Thank you, can i just fill in the tr1 form without santanders permission?
Thanks

im with santander to, they are completley unhelpful, they wont take the ex off the mortgage or the deeds although im the one now paying it and have been since he left, the excuse i keep getting is youve got to remortgage but theyve already told me they wont remortgage with me due to bad credit rating DOH . my solicitor is sending them countless letters as she is adamant he should be taken off the deeds.