Help please! Anyone heard of Sample and Partners?

Hi all,

A friend at work rung me today. She bought a house for her parents a while back, in conjunction with her sister, and has a mortgage. Going on what she’s told me, I feel she probably paid too much for the place. In any case, she told me today that she has been speaking with a company called Sample and Partners about reducing the amount of time she has to spend in paying off her mortgage. They’ve been suggesting things like using credit cards to buy day to day things then paying them off before the interest free period ends, using any spare cash to reduce the principal of her loan, and so on. No extra payments, and they are apparently the ones who negotiate with the bank. And so on. (She wanted to know if I wanted her to give them my number. I didn’t, though I said I’d have a look through their literature on Monday.)

My friend has little if any interest in investment at this stage, and knows little about finance or negotiation. Basically, while I consider her to be a truly wonderful person etc, etc, she seems to be a tad too much of an easy target for unethical businesspeople.

What I am hoping to find out here is:

Is this company reputable?

Are there any traps in this sort of thing to look out for? (I don’t know anything about these kind of companies. I’ve always negotiated directly with the bank.)

Will this company be able to do anything for my friend she couldn’t do herself? ie: are these companies of any use?

Are they likely to charge her ridiculous amounts, and hit her with undisclosed fee after undisclosed fee?

Basically, is she going to get ripped off?

Thank you for your time,

Originalsinner.

Not dead yet.