The courses, which are being subsidised by the lifetime broker, are aimed at helping more people get into the equity release market by giving them the chance to gain a professional qualification in the area.
1,000 places are available on the lifetime course and ifs said that it was ‘delighted’ with the initial response.
Mark Roberts, head of faculty financial regulation at ifs, said: “This is an excellent opportunity for those who are considering advising on equity release products to gain an appropriate qualification in this area. It is great to see Just Retirement working with mortgage advisers to raise professional standards in the industry on this scale.”
Equity release is still seen by intermediaries as a highly specialised area and many are reluctant to get involved, especially with the Financial Services Authority (FSA) watching the sector very carefully.
However, the sector is currently growing rapidly and many people involved with equity release have said a lack of advisers in the market is a major factor in what is holding development back.
Andrew Megson, sales director at Just Retirement, said: “We are absolutely delighted with the response from financial advisers, especially as we have just launched the programme. “When we launched our equity release product in October, we found there was a bottleneck in distribution so instead of just putting out a message for more mortgage advisers to get involved, we decided to put our money where our mouth was.
“We have found there is enormous customer need but there aren’t enough qualified intermediaries because of the complexity of the advice so we want to help people understand and take them through the qualification.”
