81 per cent of packagers reported an increase in volumes last year with the typical packager handling £216 million for 21 lenders and less than 8 per cent reporting a decline in business, the study revealed.
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It also showed that the majority of packagers’ work was business-to-business related, with 11 per cent working between the lender and the customer directly.
The study also reported that non-conforming mortgage business accounted for 9 per cent of packagers’ accounts. Buy-to-let accounted for 22 per cent of packager business, with self-cert accounting for 27 per cent in 2006.
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Commenting on the findings, Godfrey Blight, director of IMLA, said: “Packagers are successfully growing their businesses by providing a valuable function to intermediaries, helping them to place their difficult, mostly non-conforming, cases with a wide range of lenders. Both packagers and intermediaries agree that personal service and expertise are key to the relationships between the two parties. Packagers are clearly doing many things right and fill an important role in the mix of the UK mortgage industry.”
Anthony O’Callaghan, director at Just Mortgage Packaging, said: “Business is definitely rising as more and more lenders are doing prime packages and this is what is creating the extra volume.”
