Big bank broker business booms
UP FRONT • tmmonline.nz/news
Mortgage advisers have cracked a major milestone and originated more than half of home loans at two of the big banks in the six months to March 31. Image: Antonia Watson
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NZ and Westpac say more than half their home loans came from advisers in the first half of the financial year. Meanwhile, BNZ has seen no growth in adviser-originated loans during this period. At ANZ advisers have been steadily increasing their share of loans accounting for 39% of loans in the first half of 2020 to 55% two years later. Meanwhile, Westpac has reported 57% of its loans came from advisers. In the previous six months it said the number was more than 50%, prior to
Resimac takes on the banks Non-bank. Lender Resimac has started a campaign designed to raise awareness that the company is a specialist property lender.
Prospa expands loan products Business lender Prospa has launched a line of credit facility in New Zealand to existing customers and was looking to bring it to the adviser market soon. Prospa NZ managing director Adrienne Begbie said the line of credit product gave business owners confidence that 06
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that mortgages arranged by advisers represented about 40% of its total loan book. Westpac says the growth was "driven largely by our branch network being less available for customer visits as a result of Covid-19 lockdowns." Meanwhile, in the same period BNZ’s origination through advisers remained unchanged from six months earlier at 34.6% ANZ chief executive Antonia Watson said advisers were an important source of business for the bank. Like Westpac she said branch closures due to Covid
were part of the reason advisers share of business had grown. However, she also acknowledged lending was getting harder due to things like CCCFA, LVR restrictions and a changing housing market so borrowers needed to seek advice. While advisers account for more of ANZ's business, its actual volume of new loan accounts fell significantly from 42,000 in the previous six months to 31,000 in this current half year period. On the flip side average loan size ballooned out from $358,000 to $453,000 in the same period.
Resimac general manager New Zealand, Luke Jackson, says raising awareness will also help advisers when they put a Resimac solution in front of a customer. “The new campaign will benefit brokers and advisers dramatically by making Resimac more recognisable to everyday consumers," he says. "Our goal is to make it known that we are residential property lending specialists whose sole purpose is to ultimately help people purchase properties. By treating customers as individuals and building mortgages around their needs, we are a very different breed to the traditional financial institutions.”
“We appreciate that it can be challenging for brokers and advisers to educate their customers about lenders other than the banks, with alternate lenders only representing a fraction of the market and lacking the brand recognition of the majors. “This campaign will help change that by creating greater brand awareness and educating customers on Resimac’s value proposition. As residential property lending specialists, we’re not distracted by other products and services like insurance, credit cards and savings accounts offered by many financial institutions," Jackson says.
they would have money available when needed, without having to pay interest on it until that need arose. It would also save time in making loan applications each time they needed cash. Begbie would not say how high the line of credit would go, but said in Australia, the number is A$150,000. Prospa has recorded a highly profitable three months and said in its third quarter earnings reports that the gross value of
loans in New Zealand surpassed $100 million in the quarter. Originations had risen 64% from A$19.9 million to A$32.7 million in the past 12 months. In reporting its results, Prospa told the Australian exchange that it had a record third quarter with loan originations of A$172.1 million. This was up from A$120.8 a year earlier. ✚
