How to check if I have a floor clause in the mortgage?

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More and more people realize that they have a floor clause in their homes and decide to claim it from their bank. This decision took on special relevance since last December the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) issued the ruling that said that the amounts collected in mortgage contracts since 2009, when these clauses began to be incorporated, had to be returned.

As the vast majority of Spanish mortgages are in line with the Euribor -a fluctuating rate-, the banks decided to incorporate the floor clause that would allow them not to drop interest below a minimum, even though the Euribor to which the mortgages referred did .

Consulting a floor clause calculator is a fundamental step to avoid complications when claiming the floor clause from the bank. It allows knowing in advance the amount that can be claimed from the entity.

There is the possibility of calculating it through the calculator of the floor clause of the Organization of Consumers and Users (OCU), in which the amount can be detailed by entering some data: initial capital, date of signing of the mortgage contract, applicable differential or initial interest rate, among others.

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If you want to claim your “floor clause”, FreeClaim can help you. Our attorneys can help eliminate floor clauses included in mortgage or loan contracts. Said clauses will be considered void and the bank will have to return the undue amounts collected in application of said clause.

The so-called "floor clauses" prevent the interest rate from falling below a reference minimum, even if the Euribor (or another banking index) is below it. Currently, the Euribor is quite low, so if your mortgage has this type of abusive clauses, you may not benefit from the drop in the index.

To find out if your mortgage contract includes a floor clause, you must review the public deed of your mortgage. If it says that in any case the interest rate can be less than a fixed percentage, it is a floor clause.

In addition, you can initiate a claim on the floor clause if the interest rate that appears on your last bank statement is not equal to the Euribor (or the rate of your particular bank) plus the differential rate that you have agreed with the bank.

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We firmly believe that most of the "threshold clauses" reflected in mortgage contracts are unfair and bank customers are harmed and penalized for their lack of financial knowledge. It is convenient that expert lawyers help you so that they can negotiate with the bank on your behalf, and they can even sue the bank to save you money in each monthly payment, since the interest you pay is probably higher than the official ones set by the European Central Bank. If you contact a law firm to claim your mortgage costs, you will have the opportunity to review your deeds to make sure there is a minimum mortgage rate. If so, you can ask the Bank to return the money it is taking from you because of that abusive clause.

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Angela has more than 20 years of experience as a practicing lawyer in Spain. She has assisted English-speaking clients throughout her career in real estate, business law, immigration, as well as in areas that so often affect the lives of foreign residents, such as family law and inheritance.