Sorry to be a cynic, but how on earth would someone who overheard a conversation at work in a broker's office know that she was going to use the doll's house for a new house reveal when she hadn't even got the mortgage, she surely can't have been discussing exactly how she was going to reveal it to her followers with the mortgage adviser. It would be gross misconduct and pretty stupid of someone working at the brokers to discuss confidential details knowing that their friend would put it on tattle which sophie looks at, why would someone risk their job to do that. Also just because one broker refused the mortgage doesn't mean that others will. I also think that James not having a job won't have had a material effect on getting a mortgage or not. They live on an estate and shopped in cheap shops for their furniture, clothes and decor, obviously I have no idea of his salary but would take a punt it was more like 70/80k rather than 200k p.a. That would mean with a 4x multiple he could have got about 320/350k, which is only a small amount of the couple of million she'd want for a sizeable house with land. They also surely wouldn't have had a massive argument in front of the broker. She's got plenty of cash so if they did in fact need a mortgage I suspect she didn't get it because she hasn't got 3 years accounts to show yet. So I'm afraid this new gossip doesn't quite add up to me.