Headlines about the slump in mortgage lending have been giving the impression that a heavy crust of permafrost is encasing the home-loan industry. Not a bit of it.

While would-be home buyers are turned away with depressing regularity, plenty of people are eagerly remortgaging because their introductory offers are ending. And it is easy to forget that thousands of people depend for their livelihoods on selling mortgages and all the little add-ons that can accompany them.

The trouble is these intermediaries are becoming desperate to drum up business. The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has been fining or striking off a string of mortgage brokers for sharp practice, and now Which?, the consumer group, has come across many more examples of cutting corners.

Which? sent investigators to 50 banks, estate agents and independent advisers posing as would-be borrowers. Only four passed muster. The bank advisers came out worst, but a majority of the independent brokers were not good enough either.

Errors included not saying if they were providing advice or information, skating over key facts about mortgages, not asking enough about borrowers’ ability to repay and pushing mortgages and policies that were inappropriate.

Not all the advisers got everything wrong, but that is small consolation for customers. It means you are still left being unable to rely on anything a mortgage adviser tells you, because you cannot know whether it is good or bad.

I would be wary of going into a bank or building society for a mortgage, or any other financial product for that matter. The staff are instructed to serve their employer’s priorities — not yours. This is less true of smaller building societies, but there the risk is that the advice may not be out of the top drawer.

This is yet another example of the corrosive effects of commission-based selling. You simply cannot trust what is recommended, because that advice may be influenced by how much is going into the intermediary’s pocket.

The government and FSA still let the industry get away with murder on commission. It should be disclosed on all products. It would be much better to pay an adviser a straight fee with any commission coming back to you.

As Which? suggests, do your homework before you mortgage or remortgage. Check the FSA website (fsa.gov.uk) to see what you are entitled to expect. And if you are not paying a fee, don’t be afraid to ask your adviser: “What’s in this for you?”

Be very afraid

SHOCK, horror — millions of us are living on a knife-edge of only seven and a half weeks’ money. That is the dire warning from Yorkshire building society, based on the more mundane discovery that our average £2,474 rainy-day money is equal to less than two months’ average expenses.

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