Review: Regional Focus


It’s the right time to plan your growth by


Mark Graves, director, Pink Network


that things will eventually turn around. Many companies unfortu-


Te long awaited upturn in the mortgage market has arrived, and this month we’ve talked to two advisers, one in the North West and one in South Wales, to see how they’re managing and what their plans are. Te mortgage industry


has been through the ringer in the last five years, and it has been difficult at times for many to carry on in the hope


by


Matt Kelynack, director, Kama Mortgages, Usk, Monmouthshire


nately did not make it through, and those that are still here have had to make sacrifices along the way. Tere are those that have clung on by their fin- gertips by keeping staff levels low and working hard to make the best of every opportunity. Most surviving firms are


now at a stage that they are al- most unable to cope with the minimal staffing and need to put some long term plans in place. For those that had to make redundancies the mere


The increase in business this year has been so great in all honesty we’ve found it hard to cope on occasion. I think the difference now, compared to five or six years ago, is that we have to do so much more work to get a mortgage case through.


This extra work and the increased number of enquiries has meant we are all working much harder, and longer, to ensure the business gets done. Of course, every mortgage offers protection opportunities and with the amount of time spent on the mortgage itself, this is another reason we have to work longer. We can’t afford to let the protection side


www.mortgageintroducer.com


of the business lapse; we have a duty to our clients and of course it provides a valuable income stream. As always it is protection that can suffer if you aren’t careful. Everyone wants a mortgage, no-one wants protection, so we have to keep on to ensure our clients get the protection they need, no matter how much time it takes us. We’re moving offices in a couple of weeks and have plans to expand then. We’ll be looking at recruiting to help deal with the increased business and improve our service levels, which admittedly have not been up to our usual standard this year as we struggle to cope with the uplift in business. We’ll be relying on help from the network when it comes to recruiting as we’ve survived the credit crunch with an existing staff and haven’t recruited for years.


thought of taking on new ad- visers must be daunting. How- ever, there are two sides to the coin; coping is one thing, but can you really grow your busi- ness if you don’t have the staff to deal with the extra demand? Te answer is probably no, you can of course work your socks off, long hours, weekends and evenings but there really does have to be more to life than that. Many companies will be ap-


prehensive about recruiting again but networks support AR’s in every aspect of their business and this includes re- cruitment. Trough training


by


Graham Allsop, managing director,


Mortgage &


Insurance Needs, West Kirby


We have experienced a significant increase in mort- gage business throughout 2013. So much so that we brought a new broker into the business in March and are just in the process of recruiting someone to work specifically on protection and general insurance. Although our remortgage business hasn’t fully woken up yet, we are seeing signs that it’s about to move again and need all hands available when it does. Recruiting and growing the business isn’t some- thing I thought we’d ever do again. During the recession we did have to let members of staff go, a painful experi- ence and not one I want to repeat. So as you can


and compliance support the aim of a good network is to en- sure that AR companies don’t fail but flourish and that they understand there’s a difference between selling and having people working for you. To achieve success you need


to have the right people work- ing for you. By providing a support infrastructure, you give yourself and your staff the best chance of success through business growth. None of us can predict the future, but the general consensus is that the mortgage market is still on an upward curve. Tis is the right time to plan your growth.


imagine our expansion this year was not undertaken lightly. However, as more and more business came through the door we either had to move forward or stagnate. Moving forward was the only option and we managed to tempt our son away from his well paid, salaried, broker position to join our business. We are all working long hours to cope with demand and to ensure our mortgage cases are properly pack- aged. We do a lot of work at the front end, building cli- ent and lender relationships, gathering information and getting to know each case inside out. Although this is what takes the time, once a case is packaged we have seen offers coming through and mortgages completing much more quickly. Yes, we’re working long hours but this is what we’ve been waiting for. Long may it continue!


MORTGAGE INTRODUCER SEPTEMBER 2013 29 23


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