“We are thankfully in a better place than 12 months ago and I be- lieve I’ll be saying the same thing a year on from now. But as cli- chéd as the sound bite has become, there are clear headwinds ahead of us especially if the recent product boost begins to recede in January”


Y IS FOR YARDSTICKS


through just about the worst of it - albeit we are still faced with the prospect of two moribund years ahead before life begins to feel really worthwhile in the early part of 2014. Where does that leave us? We are


thankfully in a better place than 12 months ago and I believe I’ll be saying the same thing a year on from now. But as clichéd as the sound bite has become, there are clear headwinds ahead of us especially if the recent product boost begins to recede in January as public sector job losses proliferate. Grade: room for improvement n


Headmaster’s View


by Kevin Duffy, managing director, Mortgageforce


It wasn’t possible to assess every lender here but most are doing what they can within straitjacketed conditions. Be it funding or regulatory hurdles, lenders have their work cut out. The noble NatWest is probably the best example of a stymied lender with the absolute best intentions. On the regulatory side the FSA has several lender


applications in its in-tray. If only half of these get to see the light of day by next Easter and if these can emulate the fine start made by ING Direct in the broker market, then there may be an extra £3bn of fresh net lending next year. This may appear a trivial sum for some but the important word in that sentence was net. There will also be some well-loved building societies either re-entering or stepping up their activity next year so some of the winds blowing are genuinely benign ones. For what it’s worth I have two closing remarks for brokers and one salutary one


These of course vary from business to


business and within many self-employed models a broker may understandably elect to work to his own wallet or lifestyle. I have no argument with that so long as he’s compliant and isn’t loss making for me. But as a rule of thumb, a mortgage a week and a 50% protection policy penetration rate are decent yardsticks. Grade: could do better


Z IS FOR ZENITH


So are we nearer this than the nadir of the recovery chart? I think so. I don’t envisage the intermediary sector ever scaling £260bn again but I do foresee an optimum size of circa £100bn by 2015. And if that’s the case we are probably


for mainstream lenders. I make no apologies if these observations come across as patronising or glib in any way. To brokers it’s simply this: work harder.


Some food for thought: do you remember what your mother and father did to make ends meet growing up and do you recall your first Saturday jobs? My hunch is that your recollections of those days featured hard graft and there is nothing better for the soul. Be pragmatic about these austere times. Whether you will work for 25 or 45 years, is it so unrealistic to expect that up to five of these years might occur during a downturn? Secondly and more strategically, if you are not active in buy-to-let and short-term


lending, fix that. These two areas are where the ripest and lowest hanging fruit abounds. Even if it means buying leads, experiment. The buy-to-let sector in particular is one where being proficient now will help bridge the gap between the restoration of better conditions and LTV availability for owner-occupiers. To lenders, just one final thought on attaining the X-Factor. There is a helluva talent


pool out there brimming with displaced personnel from specialist lenders. A big part of AfI’s success is that it hasn’t been timid about tapping into this pool. Brokers can smell mediocrity a mile away and I’m afraid to say that in certain mainstream organisations there are clear examples of folk who have been over-promoted and become over-feted purely as a result of axe-wielding above them. Attaining the X-Factor is rarely about taking soft or easy options.


mortgage introducer DECEMBER 2011 33


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