Well, I propose that this should be rewritten, mortgage style, because at 23.05pm, I am waiting for the “midnight hour” to be “close at hand.”
But at midnight, there will be no werewolves. Jacko’s eyes won’t turn a strange yellow and his hands won’t stretch before our eyes.
There will be screams, however. Make no bones about that one. Especially, if the words “funds not available at this time” appear on people’s computer screens.
Why?
“Because this is Wooooolwich. Wooolwich night”
The mists are rising in the evening air. A deadly silence falls upon my log cabin and I sit patiently waiting to secure funds for my non-fee paying client.
Yes, that is right, I am not charging a fee. For the purposes of this music video I will be playing “The Mad One” clearly.
As the midnight hour draws near, my palms are starting to get sweaty. I know I only have one shot at this. A window between 12am and perhaps 12.01am to secure a miserly £383,000 for my semi-detached buying client.
Do they know the pain I am going through? No. Do they care, more to the point? No. They just want the mortgage and their semi, and I have to step up to the plate and deliver.
An owl hoots and a cat jumps on the roof of my log cabin. My heart races and it is about this point that I question exactly what alternative employment I could seek.
No Mortgage Mind!!! Don’t wonder! We are on a mission to secure Woolwich funds in, without doubt, the most obscure way I have ever done in my 14 years of being in this industry.
The clock clicks on. T-minus 37 minutes. I know that the UK is populated with hundreds of the remaining 8,000 or so brokers all sitting around, about to embark in this madness. MADNESS I tell you!!
And then it starts. I start to formulate a song. To the tune of Michael Jackson’s Thriller, but digitally remastered to work with this fiasco.
And here ladies and gentlemen, is the final version:
It’s close to midnight and Woolwich funds are lurking in the dark.
Under the moonlight, you see a sight that almost stops your heart.
You try to scream, but terror takes the sound before you make it.
Your laptops freeze and horror looks you right between the eyes
The sites paralysed
Coz this is Woolwich. Woolwich night!
The funds are gonna go and then your clients outta sight
You know it’s Woolwich, Woolwich night
You’re fighting for your rate inside a Woolwich, Woolwich
Rate fight
You hear the door slam, and realise your wife has gone to bed.
You feel the cold hand and feel the stress is going to your head.
You close your eyes, and hope that this is just imagination.
But all the while, the mortgage rate is going out your mind
You’re out of time.
Coz this is Woolwich. Woolwich night!
There ain’t no second chance to get the three-year fixed tonight girl!
Woolwich! Woolwich night.
You’re fighting for your rate inside the Woolwich, Woolwich website.
Night brokers tweet
And the industry walk in their masquerade.
There’s no escaping the jaws of dual pricing this time,
It’s the end of the line.
They’re out to get you.
There’s branches closing in on every side.
They will dual price you, unless you change that number on your dial.
Now is the time, for brokers all to cuddle close together
All through the night, I’ll save you from the terror on the screen
I’ll make you see…
That this is Woolwich, Woolwich night
The rates will thrill you more if you can book them on the daaaaamn site
Woolwich! Woolwich night
So let me hold this rate for you for, five days, starting… toniiiiiight!
(Rap performed by a Woolwich BDM)
Darkness falls across the land
The midnight hour is close at hand
And brokers crawl in search of funds,
For clients buying their dream homes.
And who soever shall be done
To miss the rates at 12.01
Must stand and face a client from hell
And rot inside their damn slow DELL
The foulest stench is in the air
I let one go, but I don’t care.
And grizzly branches everywhere,
Are closing in to steal our share
And though we broke, to stay alive
Our bodies start to shiver.
For no mere broker can resist
The Evil Woolwich Thriller.
What a night. AND funds NOT secured at 12.00am.
Thanks for listening.
HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
SHAMONE!!!!!!!!!!!!
Da da, shugachuggah.
Same again tonight now.
Lea Karasavvas is a sometime song writer and full-time managing director of Prolific Mortgages
