An Edinburgh packager called Thistle Finance has come to market founded by Mark Dyason of Edinburgh Mortgage Advice and Nathan Ellis-Calcott.
Thistle has signed a third party agreement with Mortgage Advice Bureau to support its brokers – offering an added level of service to MAB's brokers in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
The packager deals in bridging, commercial, seconds and asset finance and soft launched at the start of the year.
Thistle's website went live last month and the full launch will follow shortly.
Dyason, director of Thistle Finance and Edinburgh Mortgage Advice, said: “What we’re trying to do is bring the level of service that a private client would insist on into our packaging service and look after brokers who look after us.
“It will be growth, stabilise, growth, stabilise, in the same way Edinburgh Mortgage Advice has grown.”
Dyason founded Edinburgh Mortgage Advice in 2010 – and both firms will operate from the same office for the time being in Edinburgh.
When business grows and the staff count rises the plan is to form dedicated Edinburgh Mortgage Advice and Thistle Finance teams.
Ellis-Calcott, Thistle’s director of sales, has years of specialist finance experience.
He joined at the start of the year to join Dyason’s venture and to establish the brand.
Dyason explained: “When Nathan came along it was an enormous injection of energy, contacts and knowledge.
“Nathan felt he wanted a new challenge. We had a discussion at the back end of last year and came up with the idea of starting Thistle together.
“We’d pool our experience and contacts and base it in Scotland where there isn’t the packaging competition there is down South.
“We saw a gap in the market."
Brokers in Scotland or Northern Ireland with specialist business can be directed to Thistle, initially manually but eventually by the click of a button on MAB’s system.
While MAB will only direct brokers in Scotland and Northern Ireland to Thistle the packager will complete deals nationwide.
Thistle is dealing with a number of lenders including Masthaven, Shawbrook, Together, Precise, Roma, LendInvest, Amicus, Gatehouse, Aldermore and Affirmative.
