I have had it with my bank! (1 Viewer)

[Jeff Ulmer]

For the past 13 years I have been dealing with one of Canada's biggest banks, the Bank of Montreal. I have a number of accounts with them including my soon to be paid out mortgage, which is to be handled by the proceeds from the sale of my property.

One of the selling features of the mortgage is the ability to pay up to 20% per year on the principle. Since there is a three month interest penalty for closing my mortgage before maturity, it was suggested I make a lump sum payment to reduce this amount, which sounds like a pretty straightforward transaction. However, when talking to my trusty account manager today, he informs me that it takes them two to three days to process a prepayment from the day I request it. This pretty near makes it impossible to use the funds from the former property to make this payment, since the buying and selling transactions need to occur within a day of each other (sell one house, buy the other).

I was given the cock and bull story that this delay is so that they can calculate the interest on the account, which is of course ridiculous - they can do that on the spot. This seems like a tactic to keep people from using their prepayment option as I plan to.

I asked how much my payout would be, at least in ball park figures, but he was unable to calculate that until 15 days prior to the payout. I was told that the bank is also unable to calculate how much interest I am paying in a month, claiming it is based on a proprietary system for such calculations - sounds to me like they are fudging the books.

Needless to say, I have had it with this financial institution, and am debating bringing this up with the Better Business Bureau or other consumer groups.

 

[Chris Lockwood]

> Since there is a three month interest penalty for closing my mortgage before maturity

Really? Even though you're selling the property? Is there a due-on-sale clause, too?

 

[Shayne Lebrun]

Don't move to CIBC; I'll be dropping them very soon as being utterly useless.

 

[Jeff Ulmer]

Really? Even though you're selling the property?

Yes, plus a "discharge fee" of another $125. If you end the contract early, you pay a penalty, however in my case, if I prepay the allowed 20%, it would all but negate that penalty. Their scam is that because of the procssing time, you are without a residence while they "process" the prepayment, because you can't discharge the mortgage, thereby being unable to pay for the new property.

However, it may be worth doing a cash advance on the credit cards to cover the prepayment restriction, since whatever interest would acrue in three days will be nowhere near what the interest penalty would be.

 

[Tony Whalen]

Sounds like complete BS to me Jeff!

We've moved most of our stuff (mortgage included) over to Royal. So far, so good.