Live event synopsis
In response to the release of our latest whitepaper, ‘The UK Mortgage Market Review’, we hosted a live event with experts in the lending sector to delve into the research paper. Our whitepaper looks at the recent impacts on the mortgage market, emerging trends, and potential risks through regulatory compliance.
Our live event featured some of the leading minds in the field.
Steven Hewlett-Light, Head of Product Delivery at Recordsure, chaired the event and led the Q&A panel discussions with the speakers.
Tony Wells, Guest Speaker, Head of Competence & Evaluation, Home Buying & Ownership at the NatWest Group
Craig Skelton, Managing Director at CS Financial Group Limited
Stuart Mosley, Director at SJ Financial Solutions
Andrew Montlake, Managing Director at Coreco
The UK Mortgage Market Review
The mortgage market has been undoubtedly healthy since the 2008-2009 financial crisis. In that time, the lending market has swelled to £280 billion. Although, in the first five months of the pandemic, over 1.9 million mortgage accounts were subject to emergency payment holidays, evidence that the pandemic has had a dire impact on the financial wellbeing of millions. Despite this, after the first lockdown was lifted, mortgage approval saw an increase of 66,300 applications being accepted, which is 7x higher than in May 2020, showing that the industry saw massive fluctuations monthly.
What will be the main drivers impacting the sector in the next 12 months?
To initiate this conversation, Steven brought Tony Wells in. Tony stated he was in an excellent position to answer this as he works predominately in a support function within NatWest where he can survey the entire environment facing the industry. Tony issued a prediction that included a myriad of external factors which would impact the industry. These included positive Brexit trade deals, which could see the industry benefit, a downward trajectory for the pandemic and a positive plan set forward by the Chancellor in recent days.
Craig Skelton took this point further. He stated that from his perspective, the future looks to revolve primarily around affordability for mortgage lending. Borrowers and lenders alike live on shifting ground at the moment, and any predictions on affordability come at the expense of understanding the next stage that awaits the industry. The current plan is to reopen many businesses in different sectors, but these plans could change as they’re depended on predictions about the virus, which changes rapidly, with no notice.
What are the main difficulties advisers face in months to come?
Our guests unanimously agreed that the main limitation that advisors face is the Brexit question. Uncertainty within financial markets casts doubt, which leads to unfavourable risk being taken on by financial institutions.
Andrew Montlake lends accuracy to this by explaining that the Brexit trade deal is complete, however, the financial services trade deal is not. This impacts the short term issues where brokers struggle to deal with overseas clients, such as ex-pats or multinationals. The risk here is that these clients will move on and seek assistance from nations within the EEA, or for those that remain, advisers will have to comprehend and adhere to different financial regulations than those that solely apply to the UK.
Global pandemic and customer vulnerability
The increased level of customer vulnerability unquestionably brings new focus to process and compliance. Along with the standard mortgage application process, firms realise the importance of recognising customer vulnerability. Speech recognition AI-based technologies, like Recordsure’s Voice solution, play an important role in providing insights. They help highlight potential client vulnerability and play a positive role in assisting advisors to ensure fair treatment.
Recordsure‘s speech analytics turn customer conversations into valuable insights that offer unique intelligence to better respond to customer’s needs and circumstances.
To gain more insights from our esteemed panellists, you can revisit the session by watching the video from the event by clicking the image above.
