Help To Buy Avis 

Please do not use this service!!

I have been trying to get permission to either auction or rent my property for four months now. Every employee I speak to tells me a different story. Only today have I been provided with the redemption form to start the process.....DO NOT use this service. I told them my flat is unsellable -over 14 months on the market with mortgage brokers refusing to lend on my complex - and I have provided a multitude of documents, all for them to request more information and that I will have to wait a further 10 working days to get a response to be accepted.
The restrictions imposed by Help to Buy borderline criminal. I am leaving the area to be closer to family, starting a new job, and H2B have stated I will have to pay both rent at the new property and I have not been provided any support or permissions to rent/auction my current place.
I notified H2B that if it wasnt for my resilience and support, killing myself would be a viable option. They simply said there is nothing they can, here is a number to call.

Raising a complaint required three emails before acknowledgment. STAY AWAY from this God awful, horrendous, disgusting company.

Awful customer service who just respond with generated replies and don't ready your email.

I'm trying to change my wife's name on the account. They can't deal with it via her email and send a generic reply. They also won't deal with me as "We've been unable to identify you using the information you have provided." When I ask what is incorrect they can't tell me and when I email to ask for my application/account number I get the same response.

How can I make a change and give you the correct information, if you won't tell me how to get it!

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I had a very positive experience with the Help to Buy team throughout the process of redeeming my equity loan.

Everyone I spoke to was polite, professional and genuinely helpful. Whenever I had questions or needed clarification, they took the time to explain everything clearly and made sure I understood the next steps. A special thank you to David and the customer service team for their support and for helping to ensure everything progressed smoothly.

Redeeming an equity loan can feel like a stressful process, but the team were reassuring and responsive from start to finish. Thank you all for your assistance – it was greatly appreciated!

I contacted Help to Buy today following the rejection of my RICS valuation due to an error on my surveyor’s behalf. I had already contacted my surveyor to request an amendment, and after some back and forth my surveyor was refusing to budge on this matter. Feeling stressed, I explained my predicament to a colleague named Matthew who was extremely understanding, empathetic, and went above and beyond to help despite this not being Help to Buy’s fault. The matter was referred to a team leader called Connor G, who very kindly took the time to review the communications between ourselves and our surveyor, and send a thorough email to me for my surveyor outlining the requirements of the RICS valuation. Sadly, our surveyor did not budge, so I called Help to Buy again to explain the situation from the email response I had received. The woman I spoke to again was extremely helpful but sadly I did not catch her name. She very quickly and professionally referred the process back to a manager who made an exception despite Help to Buy not being accountable for the issues we were having. I am extremely grateful and impressed with the service I have received and want to give due praise to the colleagues who took their time to deal with our issue and go the extra mile to make this a smoother process for us.

Literally the worst customer service you'll ever experience. Help To Buy in iteslf is a complete an utter scam. Fees & costs for everything as you try to exit, completely unacceptable and just a government money making scheme off people trying to get on the property ladder.

This is an appealing company. They do everything possible so that you can’t pay your loan off. Please allow 2 years for the process so that can keep the loan going for as long as possible. The customer advisers all have different views on what is acceptable and ultimately need the loan to continue to stay in employment.

Go in with the view that it will never be completed and you can’t be disappointed. I can see this on Martin Lewis show soon enough.

Dire. Beyond repair? My son bought a house through HTB. They are beyond DIRE. Two years ago we tried to buy them out with an accepted redemption of £30k. They were so poor it fell through, and after appeals he got £1k in compensation. Move forward 2 years and attempt 2. Now redemption was £60k which I paid. A Government organization with no come back - as bad as they can be with no consequences for THEM just for us.

Horrendous company to deal. Especially when trying to pay off the help to buy loan.

They are not very professional.

If I could give less than 1 star I would. They are quite simply the most awful incompetent organisation I have ever dealt with. If I say that I have been through 3 complaints with them via the Financial Ombudsman plus there own internal complaints process, all of which were upheld in my favour, that should say everything!
In April 2024 I started the process to pay off my equity loan, 2 years and 3 valuations on, I still haven't managed to do so. They constantly change the goalposts and as a previous reviewer has said, they make themselves out to be the victims. Anyone wishing to use this company, please for your own sanity, do not, they are useless, rude and quite unsafe to deal with as they are not consistent.

One of the most difficult processes ever. They will have you jumping through hoops to pay off your loan. I've never hit so many hurdles, the further I got the more difficult they got, they change how they accept things, they don't bother telling you, one month they accept scans next month they accept pdfs, then it's combined pdf but in all honesty it felt like your getting further along so we will hit you with why we are declining this and that for silly reasons and you'll never find out it's been rejected until you chase. I've had to extend my valuation more money on top of more money all due to them. If you want a migraine for months on end and crippling anxiety then it's great but I am mentally drained from dealing with them. It was less stressful borrowing a large amount from a bank than it was to pay help to buy. They say don't chase on phone but believe me you'll never hear of them if you don't and things will stay sat there until you find your paying again for an extension

If I could give a no star I would.
Sent all info including valuation report, then waited, and waited, despite their email claiming they've "allocated this along with any supporting documentation you've provided to your account to be reviewed" no one got in touch for 3 months.
When I did they totally victim blamed saying I should've filled in an application form to repay, nowhere in their email did it say this. I now have to redo a valuation ie pay for a surveyor, which they claim will be refunded. I don't believe anything they say.
I did call them before I did anything, and the call handler never told me the need to fill in an application. I believe their staff have poor training.

Customer Service - Fantastic.

We are in the process of repaying the loan, I got married in the 5yrs since the loan was taken so all of the paperwork was initially rejected due to the difference.

However, I rang the customer service team and spoke with Jack DG, he was extremely helpful and manage to sort the system their side to allow all the document to be accepted & I didn't need to redo this.

Fantastic and friendly and made the process a lot easier.

Thanks again Jack.

Our direct debit failed once for what ever reason (bank issue, not lack of funds).
An email and letter arrived to say we hadn't paid and were now in arrears, so I paid it, this did not stop the arrears letters coming making me feel like I was refusing to pay. I paid via card, rang them to arrange a direct debit but after hours on hold decided to eventually hang up, month after a letter arrives to say we have again missed the payment and need to pay within 7 days, so I pay online, this repeats itself for over a year now but I still constantly receive emails and letters saying I'm in arrears when I'm not, bad organisation, lazy as shite .. when I reply to their emails to say I've paid it, they reply asking for my details, which are on the email I replied to... Horrible bastard company

Shocking organisation. Moved out of the property 18 months ago and still haven't been able to repay the loan. Lenvi won't issue an authority to complete document, with each communication with this company (by phone or email) stating a new issue, that wasn't previously mentioned. We are asked to change the date of memo of sale, change the valuation date, etc. with the terms constantly changing. Why can't I pay back what is government money???

Absolutely useless.
They’ve made selling my house a nightmare.
Constantly having to chase them, to be told another issue has come up that they’ve not bothered informing you about.

Service is beyond incompetent. Have spent 11 months simply trying to remove a homeowner from the equity loan to no avail. Strike me as being very under resourced, and often give out incorrect advice over the phone. The solicitor’s pack even contains a list of information / requirements which are incorrect. They accept that they are wilfully sending this out with the wrong instructions. Wild!

Never in my life have I dealt with a more incompetent and poorly run organisation.

We were fortunate enough to be in a position to pay off our equity loan, however this has been the most painful, grueling process I have ever encountered.

£200 admin fee to submit a form that we fill out in its entirety. £400 to obtain an RICS valuation of the property. £700 as solicitors must be involved. After submitting our initial admin form, I had to chase 5 times as they had ‘forgotten’ to submit my form each time. Well worth the £200 admin fee. After months from initial form submission we finally get to a position of sending over the funds, our solicitors transferred the money. 2 weeks went by and we had heard nothing, which is incredibly concerning when large sums of money are involved. We called HelpToBuy and somehow they hadn’t even realised the money was with them. This meant they hadn’t started the process of closing the case and sending the DS1 to land registry in order to remove the charge. Once they had become aware, they told us we they had overpaid us by £1 and cannot submit the DS1 until a refund has been issued. Still haven’t received the refund a week later and therefore still haven’t submitted the DS1 to remove the charge. From original form submission to finally removing the charge from land registry will have taken 3/4 months by the time this is done.

How can it be so difficult and time consuming to pay off a loan. Every other company in the world this would be complete within a week, yet it’s a process that takes months with help to buy.

Customer service is non existent, no proactive outreach, no reactive responses, just no communication whatsoever. If this was a private business it would no longer be in existence.

Utterly abysmal service. Poor support, zero customer service and cost me a fortune to et out of in loan payment and additional "fees"

Paid the loan in full and they have not redunded the interest or no letters.

Even though the process is somewhat complicated I would like to mention that Ryan and Brandon from Help to Buy have been outstanding in supporting me to get my Redemption Paperwork and onto the final phase of payment completed whilst I’m over in the USA. Thanks again!