which will give brokers the ability to obtain a decision in principle and complete full applications online. “This will streamline the application
process but will not detract from our commitment to sensible underwriting based on a customer’s circumstances,” he adds.
now’s not the time for innovation With Kensington offering a range of products that cater to the sort of customer that won’t fall into a basic, straightforward high street deal, the next step in product development would be to look at the market for self-employed. But while Street says there is no return in sight for traditional self-cert he does recognise a market need for mortgages catering for genuinely reputable self- employed people in the UK. “We don’t service that market at the moment and I’m not sure where we’re going to go in terms of Kensington’s development in that respect. Self-cert is a difficult one but I do think it is possible to build a product that meets the needs of self-employed people without it being self-cert,” he says. “The current arrangement at
Kensington looks at verified income after 12 months trading, whereas I think the high street banks currently ask for 24 months. Using income verification we can take a more pragmatic view and make a responsible decision looking at all the data.”
When challenged on whether a more specific product to cater for this market might be on the cards for Kensington, Street is measured. “Our history and pedigree was always one of innovation but I don’t think now is the time for innovation,” he says. “I think now is the time for planned, controlled growth – that’s what we’re looking for. The market is still suffering a lot of uncertainty about where it’s going.”
the Buy-to-let Bug Kensington’s launch into the buy-to-let market has been one of many in the past year. We’ve seen new intermediary lender Precise Mortgages launch, Platform return to the buy-to-let sector and Aldermore
launch a range of buy-to-let products. Paragon Mortgages too seems poised to return to the market with the ubiquitous caveat of “when the wholesale funding markets return”.
Kensington is in good company then, but Street says the lender is not focusing too heavily on this spoke of its proposition.
“I think when we initially set out we wanted a balanced portfolio so I would imagine that the majority of our business will be in residential and we will complement that with a proportion of buy- to-let,” he says.
“The launch has gone really well, the phones lit up and we had record levels of phone calls into the Reading call centre during the first week of launch. Every day we broke another record and we started to see KFIs and applications in through the door within two weeks.”
tCf, the fsa and that fine Following the crisis in the mortgage market and its inherent market failures the Financial Services Authority was determined to crack down and one of the headline-hitting cases of the past year involved Kensington being fined for failing to treat customers fairly.
The £1.23 million fine was doled out for a range of reasons including applying unfair arrears charges and failing to oversee outsourced servicing effectively - in this case the third party servicer was Homeloan Management (HML). The lender has since worked through the problems with the FSA and repaid affected customers, but the experience has clearly sobered Street who is both accepting of Kensington’s faults and keen to gain clarity and offer better service in the future.
“I think the action that we have recently gone through raises the question of where the ultimate responsibility for TCF lies,” he says. “We worked through that with the FSA and with the customers who were individually affected. And have completed a redress programme to rectify those problems.”
“However I do think it has raised a question as to how lenders and their third party administrators work together going forward. Controls need to be in place
to ensure we continue to live up to the responsibility that’s expected of us.”
Beyond the Champions league So what’s in store for this sleeker more tempered Kensington then? Again it comes back to Keith Street being a realist. “I agree with the Council of Mortgage Lenders, that to achieve the original forecast of gross lending of £160 billion in 2010 is going to be a challenge,” he says. “There’s still a lot of uncertainty. House price indices are up one month, down the next, and feel good factor plays an awfully big part in people’s desire to buy or upscale.
“I think it’ll be a tough rest of the year without spectacular results. But for us coming out of two years not lending, that’s an improvement on where we were this time last year,” says Street, who also sits on the CML executive committee. “I think Kensington is now benefiting
from being part of a much bigger organisation that has an ethos of entrepreneurialism. It’s very much about the spirit of can do rather than can’t do. And want to try, and want to find solutions,” he says. “That’s a good environment to be in. Everyone who is still here has made an active decision to stay with Kensington throughout the past two years, when it was pretty hard going. And I think we all did that because we wanted to see it through and build a better future for it. I know it sounds cheesy, but it means there’s a really good spirit within the team which you just don’t get overnight.” Kensington is moving cautiously
towards reinstating itself as a serious contender in the intermediary lending sector just as Tottenham is gearing up for the Champions League. It’s no coincidence that Keith Street is a fan of both. But it’s Chelsea manager Carlo Ancelotti who perhaps best sets the tone for the coming season, both for Tottenham and Kensington. “Tottenham haven’t played with continuity, but have played football with very good quality. They have very good players with a lot of quality. They could challenge next season – they can fight for the title.” n
mortgAge introducer AUGUST 2010 27
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44