The survey showed 42 per cent of packagers felt having more product exclusives was the most important support they could receive from lenders to help build their business. Of the 73 packagers questioned, 25 per cent said having more technology support was most important. Other aspects highlighted in the survey were receiving larger procuration fees and more marketing support.
Nigel Payne, managing director of TMB, said: “This research has confirmed that we’re focusing our energies in the way our customers want us to. We are always working with packagers to come up with deals that will appeal to their market and on the technology side we’ve just relaunched our website, which will make it easier for mortgage packagers to deal with TMB online.”
But Paul Brett, director of Freehold, felt that the figures only revealed half the story. He said: “It’s very positive that TMB is looking at the packager market and asking what would be best to get more business from them. But I think lenders that use packagers would be more prudent in creating more innovative products. The reality is that the specialist areas that packagers were created for are no longer specialist. What lenders need to look at is a new generation of products for areas like the shared ownership scheme the government is pushing. Packagers would like the opportunity to specialise more.
“If mortgage lenders really want to add value and increase their packager business, then they need to bring out a product range that is technologically more demanding, definitely more innovative and certainly more specialist – one that only packagers have access to. We’ll get involved in that and it would mean packagers become valuable again. Mortgage lenders need to look more at the bigger picture.”
