Are my parents getting scammed by our broker?
Recently, my parents have decided to stop renting and buy a place in NSW. They’ve had their eyes on very expensive suburbs and apparently they’ve gotten pre-approved by their broker for an eye-watering amount of money. I’ve checked against borrowing capacity calculators and I’m almost 100% sure they’ve been pre-approved for an amount 2x what they can actually afford. Yes, they know they will be financially strained. No, they literally will not listen to me or my siblings.
I’ve been trying to dissuade them because NSW does not have subject to finance clauses, and there’s always an off-chance that their unconditional offer (if they get it) will get audited before settlement and they’ll lose their entire deposit. Am I worrying unnecessarily? Apparently their broker “did some magic” with an accountant, but if their deal falls through, I can’t imagine they can go direct to a bank as a fall-back and get the same amount. From what I can tell, it’s a bank-affiliated broker.
Is there a way to double-check this sort of thing? The more I try and persuade them, the more they seem to want to gamble on it and keep reassuring me that the banks definitely won’t check again. I absolutely think they will, because their payslips absolutely do not line up with the amount being approved.