Countrywide. It’s a tricky conundrum given the continuing pressure on housing transactions and a debilitating lack of mortgage finance, not to mention pressure on household incomes, rising taxes and public sector cuts that threaten to put hundreds of thousands of people out of a job. “It’s interesting looking at the financial services division of Countrywide and thinking how can I make that better,” he says. “What products could we offer that we don’t at the moment? Should we have more people or fewer people? What do we want to do in high net worth, what don’t we want to do? Can we hook up with conveyancing in some way so we can get lenders to offer us something that nobody else has got?”


He is confident of the skills he brings to this job. In a market where quality is better than quantity and those you know are crucial to getting a foot in the door, Stockton’s in a strong position. His understanding of the lending market, restrictions on it and gaps within the process infrastructure is highly valuable to Countrywide in such a tough market. It is the relationships he built while poacher that Stockton intends to leverage as gamekeeper. “We have grown our market


share substantially over the last two years by innovating and maintaining our business levels in a contracting market,” Stockton explains.


“The business has between 650 and 700 mortgage advisers across the UK and a 10% share of the intermediary transaction mortgage market. But the principal reason for that growth has been a concentration on transactions.”


EffiCiEnCy The challenge now is how to find ways of growing the business beyond this. In a market where transactions look as though they will struggle to reach 600,000 in 2011 – roughly half the number at the peak of the market – efficiency is the new vogue. “I am looking at the areas of financial


services we’re in and looking at ways in which we can increase our take, increase our share and grow the


business to make more money,” says Stockton. “At the moment we’re good at


contacting the customer when their deal is up for renewal and we have a peripatetic sales force meaning remortgaging is probably about a quarter of our volume. We need to grow that.” On top of this core objective, Stockton


is thinking about complementary business offerings and potential synergies between Countrywide’s traditional financial services offering and untapped markets. “Lettings and conveyancing are


areas for Countrywide where we can significantly grow despite the market,” he says. “By comparison estate agency and


financial services are contingent on people coming into branches and buying and selling houses. We know that next year is going to be tough so these areas of the business will be more about cost control, efficiency, investing in IT and automation. But you’re not going to grow your top line very easily. “Conveyancing on the other hand


presents an opportunity to do new business. Lenders will increasingly become interested in outsourcing their conveyancing as fraud is becoming more of an issue. It makes sense to use a professional, scalable provider. We’re well placed to benefit from that,” he says. He’s also keen to work out how best


to benefit from the lettings market, which is proving resilient through a tough economy and developing the high net worth proposition to take advantage of the relationships Countrywide has access to through Group brands Hamptons International, John D Wood & Co. and Sotheby’s International Realty UK. “We don’t offer any service by which


you can get wealth products, funds under management products or pension products,” he says. “Now, there are times to sell those products and time not to sell those products. When you’re moving house or buying your first house, that’s absolutely not the time to sell those products.


“But when you’re two years in or


coming up for your second renewal (which we’re now dealing with) then that might be an opportunity to partner with someone to sell or introduce those products in some form of revenue share. We are also looking at developing what our own advisers can offer.”


rElationshiPs


At the heart of developing these relationships is the understanding that intermediary distribution channels may be subject to improvements but will fundamentally remain a vital part of the mortgage market.


“At the moment I think the concentration on direct lending by the big banks is fine but when the base rate moves back up and the remortgage market returns it’ll be brokers who can move quickly and flexibly,” says Stockton. “It’s very hard for a lender to move its fixed cost base or number of advisers up or down, and that’s going to be even more the case when the Mortgage Market Review comes in with CeMap 3 and individual registration. “My own view is that consumers love choice and convenience and advice. And brokers do that brilliantly. You can pick your lender and have convenience of service, execution and advice. A lender can’t compete with that.” Was it that which finally pushed Stockton to join the broker ranks, I venture?


“I’m very optimistic about the broker channel but it was really more that idea of challenge and opportunity,” he says. “It’s different for everyone but I love change. Countrywide is all about challenge and stretching myself and, actually, that’s what matters.” Stockton’s plans for the future of Countrywide’s financial services division certainly represent some considerable change and it’s a big challenge he’s set himself. Whether ambition and optimism will be enough to help him meet that challenge, time will tell, but in a market so transformed by the events of the past three years, it seems a good place to start. n


moRtgage intRoduceR FEBRUARY 2011 25


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