The director of new homes at Mortgage Advice Bureau said although specialist new build businesses are built around strong and close relationships with builders and may be the first priority for the business, the adviser’s priority must always be the client.
He said: “With any other lead source the customer comes first and just because builders are very demanding it does not mean our focus should change in any way. One does not have to be at the expense of the other."
Frankish made the remarks during a Mortgage Introducer roundtable earlier this month after brokers said the relationship with the developer was paramount for their businesses.
Speaking at the roundtable Philip Tull, mortgage adviser at Threshold, said: “The relationship a new build specialist broker has with the developer is the most important relationship I’ve had in 30 years in financial services.
“Whenever I’ve worked directly for a bank or a building society there is a constant foot flow of traffic that comes through and they want to speak to you.
“The relationship with the builder in my view is more important than the relationship with the client because it is the means to maintaining your business and there are numerous brokers who will pay lip service to customer service in relationship to the builder and won’t provide feedback.
“We instil in our guys that this is the key: if you get a missed call you ring it back, if you have spoken to a client you ring the site with feedback.
“We are basically both earning a living out of the same pool; the pool being the sites you look after. The developer can’t sell the property unless the client is qualified and able to get a mortgage so we’re providing that bit. We can’t provide the mortgage unless there is a property for it.”
Frankish said while he agreed, being a network meant that MAB had to be “incredibly careful”.
He added: “The latest thematic review hammered the intermediary sector for not talking to the customer enough about what their needs were.
“I don’t disagree with Philip but you’ve got to be very careful because the regulator is looking at us closely where we are taking the customer on a journey.”
