Charterhouse Research, a specialist financial market research consultancy, has revealed the results of its ‘Mortgage Intermediaries – The Regulated Environment’ study. It has been measuring intermediary reaction to the newly-regulated market over the past eight months and has revealed that many are struggling with the new sales process.
The research found the introduction of KFIs has had a huge impact on the sales process. As well as lengthening the interview, intermediaries have noted an increase in client confusion which has ultimately resulted in brokers presenting fewer choices to customers.
One respondent to the study echoed Mortgage Introducer’s ‘Get The Facts Straight’ campaign for a standardised KFI when they said: “Without a doubt the sales process percentage wise is 20 per cent longer [because of] the hoops you have to go through before and afterwards. Instead of having one interview sale we now have two. The shortest KFI is probably six to seven pages and the longest is 11 pages.”
Julie Irwin, director of Charterhouse Research, said: “Efficient service from lenders and clarity of underwriting has assumed even greater importance in an environment where the introduction of KFIs has increased the intermediary’s sales process.”
The research also revealed that confidence in sourcing systems is returning.
In January this year intermediaries cited sourcing accurate KFIs as a major problem and most were approaching lenders directly for the documents.
However, six months on, 68 per cent of brokers surveyed are now using sourcing systems to obtain KFIs. Trigold (59 per cent) is the most commonly used sourcing system.
Bill Safran, CEO of Trigold, said: “Sourcing systems have worked very closely with lenders to get better data accuracy and it’s extremely pleasing that intermediaries are feeling increasingly confident using us.”
Further results revealed, on average, intermediaries are now placing business with an average repertoire of 11 lenders but that the top three lenders are winning over half (58 per cent) of the total business.
