How can the broker and lender relationship be improved?

Communication is a key issue, mortgage advisers suggest

How can the broker and lender relationship be improved?

The relationship between brokers and lenders underpins much of the business in the mortgage industry, yet like any relationship it can be difficult at times. But given the way in which they interact can play a key role in customer outcomes, what more can be done to enhance the work they do together, and the success that they can collectively achieve?

Estimates vary, but there are thought to be around 5,200 broker firms in the UK, and approaching 1,000 lenders. Affecting positive change with good working habits across such a large population of mortgage professionals will never be easy, of course, but among the brokers Mortgage Introducer has spoken with, there’s clearly a desire to maintain the best relationship they can have with lenders. A common theme emerges – they want better communication.

Sofía Zerené (pictured left), who is director of Prospectus Financial, values her working relationship with business development managers, but wishes it to be more interactive. “It would be nice if we had more one-to-one interaction with BDMs,” Zerené told Mortgage Introducer. “After COVID, there was a time where we couldn't get hold of anyone and obviously people were working from home. Lately, I'm seeing a lot more lenders are getting their BDMs on the case again, which is good - it's nice to see it.” She added that she would also appreciate seeing some improvement in lenders’ administrative operations. “Sometimes it's not very supportive of brokers,” Zerené said. “Some lenders will say you can't access an offer online, for example, which is a bit awkward for us as brokers who have actually introduced the client to them. So it would be good if there was a little bit more acknowledgement there for brokers to access client files.”

There’s a similar wish from broker Kelly Worthington (pictured centre), director of All You Need Mortgages, who wants greater access to underwriters. “It would be useful with lenders if their underwriters would pick up the phone up to you,” she said. “Since COVID, everybody relies on email so much. It's all emails - pick up the phone! It's a lot easier. If underwriters could speak directly to you, that could sometimes save a little bit of time.”

Gaurav Shukla (pictured right), managing director of Home Me Mortgages, is concerned with communication too, but in his case he doesn’t want lenders to be communicating directly with a client over a broker’s head. “There are a few lenders out there who will contact the customer directly when we're doing applications,” Shukla said. “We're dealing with the client, not the lender. But they send the customer a text or an email to say their mortgage offer has been issued. That's for us, specifically, to tell the customer that we've got them the mortgage offer, as we've done the work for it. We then ask them for a review at that point. The lender takes that away from us because they've already received the good news. I think allowing the broker to have the full communication with the client is what's needed.”

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The importance of a consistent point of contact

Access to underwriters is key for broker Emily Franks, director of Emily’s Mortgage Services. “Some lenders do this really well, when you get to speak to an underwriter, some not so much,” she said. “Some underwriters tend to hide from brokers, which I get - we are quite demanding and we want answers.” Consistency is important, in her view. “You can speak to an underwriter about a case. and then two weeks later, it's picked up by a different underwriter, and they're telling you something different, and you just think, ‘I'm going round and round in circles - this is insane!’”

As head of mortgages at his business Orton Financial, broker Luther Yeates sees a difference between private banks and high street lenders. “It comes back to the underwriting really,” Yeates said. “If you take a private bank, the banker is the underwriter, so generally, you've got a good relationship on both sides. You can get a loan approved. If it's something they don't like, you can talk about it. If you go to a high street bank, it's faceless. It goes into a system and an underwriter will look at it. If they don't like something, they won't talk about it, they'll just push it out and say ‘no’, and that's quite damaging to a relationship because you can't have a two way conversation.”

Mortgage adviser Alison Dearman worked for a building society for over 35 years until she was made redundant, and has since switched to become a broker, working with Chris Law Mortgages. She therefore has a perspective on both worlds, and is enjoying the communication she has with lenders in her broker role. “What I see is that lenders seem to be increasingly wanting to get their business from brokers,” she said. “They're scaling back their mortgage workforces generally. I think it's more cost efficient for them to get business introduced from a broker than it is for them to employ somebody to do that business.” 

Dearman, in fact, finds it easier now to seek contact with a lender’s decision makers. “It's very difficult to get a personal interaction with an underwriter, when you are working for a bank, whereas as a broker I've got access to BDMs, I've got access to underwriters, I can get straight to the people that make the decisions much easier,” she commented. “Getting applications which are outside of the norm accepted is much easier as a broker than it ever was working for a lender.”