Chilvester Financial celebrates 20th anniversary
2019 sees independent financial advisory firm Chilvester Financial celebrate 20 years of advising clients on equity release and, as a result of the demand for our client centric advice proposition, still we continue to strengthen our later-life team. Having seen a doubling of enquiries as a result of our joining the Equity Release Council last year, we have recently promoted Melissa Thurgood to lead up the Equity Release team.
As a chartered firm, we place great emphasis on staff training and development and January 2019 has seen the appointment of Rocky Riccalton as our dedicated Training and Competence Manager. Rocky’s appointment gives us the ability to further strengthen our Adviser of Tomorrow training programme which has seen us develop a high proportion of our current experienced adviser team from trainee beginnings.
This year also sees the retirement from advising and from day to day activity of Director Tony Capener, whom many of you will know. We are pleased that Tony will remain as chairman of the Board, so we shall still benefit from his years of experience and knowledge and we wish him well with the slower pace of life on his smallholding.
More information about Chilvester, our team and their successes are available at https://chilvester.co.uk
Finance Roome – Laura Healey
Laura Healey joined us here at The Finance Roome about six months ago. She has worked in financial services for approximately 19 years, giving mortgage advice since 2001 at C&G and then RBS. She has also advised on mortgages and protection for corporate estate agents locally – a breadth of experience! Laura prides herself on customer service, so is an excellent fit for us.
When Laura joined our team, she was keen to pursue an interest in advising on Equity Release. We are excited to say that she has just passed her CeRER, gaining a Merit and a Distinction. We are now poised to take the ER market by storm.
Bower Retirement Limited
2018 has been a year of focus and progression for Bower. Reinvestment has been at the core of our strategy with concentration on building outstanding bespoke administrative support for our national advisers. Our management team continues to expand with new appointments in Sales, Compliance and Operations.
Damon O’Connell, Head of Advisory Services joined us in August overseeing sales, the customer contact centre, customer experience and our nationwide advisers. Previously a senior manager with RBS, Damon’s focus will be on business development and customer experience.
Alan Baldwin joined us in November to head up our compliance department. Alan has extensive compliance management experience in the equity release and mortgage industry.
Another major role has also been filled with a new appointment, Dean Hall takes over as Head of Operations from January and previously a senior manager at Lloyds. Dean’s experience of operations within the mortgage industry will be an essential part of the new management team at Bower.
Geoff Charles, CEO says with a strong infrastructure and emphasis on exemplary customer service coupled with innovative marketing, we are looking forward to a successful 2019.
Options Mortgages
In 2019 we celebrate 20 years of providing professional mortgage advice to clients, some of whom have been with us since the beginning.
We understand the importance of listening to clients and understanding their needs before finding a solution that is tailored to their individual requirements.
With support from several professional contacts including accountants and solicitors we can provide a comprehensive support network to our mortgage clients.
We provide a personal, professional service and offer home visits 7 Days a Week.
Canada Life – Workshops designed with you in mind
The equity release industry is booming, with the Equity Release Council announcing a 24% increase year-on-year in Q3 2018. And in a post pension freedoms world, many customers are realising that the value in their property vastly exceeds that in their pensions, savings and investments, and recognise that tapping into that property wealth could be a sensible solution.
Our new series of Workshops have been developed with this market growth in mind and are designed to help advisers feel better equipped. Whether you wish to get qualified and join the equity release sector, or you’re an experienced adviser who wants to add to their toolkit, we’ve got something for you. Advisers can choose to sign up to some, or all, of the following Workshops:
- Equity Release Exam Workshop – Designed with mortgage advisers in mind, our Equity Release Exam Workshops reflect our commitment to growing the market and are a great opportunity for those who want to add the equity release qualification to their toolkit. They will help you to prepare for either the Certificate in Equity Release (CII) or the Certificate in Regulated Equity Release (CeRER) (LIBF) qualification.
- Setting the Standard Workshop – Designed with equity release advisers in mind, our Setting the Standard Workshops look at best practise in the industry, and what you should be considering when you speak to your customers to ensure good customer outcomes.
- Equity Release Lead Generation Workshop – Designed for advisers trying to increase their engagement with the market, our Lead Generation Workshops are designed to help you become the local area expert for later life lending, helping you to deliver better outcomes to your customers.
- Long Term Care Exam Workshop – Our Long Term Care Exam Workshops will help you to provide more holistic financial advice when dealing with customers who may need further support. These workshops will give you the knowledge you need to sit your CF8 exam.
Our workshops are free of charge to attend and will be run nationwide throughout the year. To register your interest for our Workshops, or to secure your place, simply visit www.canadalife.co.uk or contact us on 0800 068 0212.
Key Retirement Group
After a busy year, the final quarter of 2018 did not get noticeably quieter for the team at Key Retirement Group. Indeed, the 2018 figures which the Key Market Monitor unveiled recently highlighted that the sector saw £3.6bn worth of new equity released last year – an increase of 19%. While the group now boasts over 500 employees, appointments continued to be made to support its growth aspirations including, Georgina Callaghan (Group Director of Change) and Kay Westgarth (National Account Manager – Key Partnerships). We were also delighted to announce that more 2 life now has £2billion worth of loans under management – doubling its total loan size in a year. The year ended on a high when Legal & General announced an agreement with Natwest to help the banks interest-only mortgage customers with the advice to be provided by The Retirement Lending Advisers (TRLA) – equity release experts who are part of Key Retirement Solutions.
Ferret Reaches Final of Innovating for Ageing Competition
Ferret’s mission to use technology to help the elderly and disabled recognised by national industry awards celebrating innovation to help the vulnerable
Ferret, the welfare benefits expert company, is delighted to announce that it has been shortlisted as one of 12 leading entries in a ground-breaking national competition run by retirement income provider Just Group and the International Longevity Centre (ILC).
Ferret’s service aims to help the elderly and those with disabilities by providing them with information about their right to welfare benefits and to automatically tell them about changes that affect them.
It offers a web and email system to help customers find out about the benefits they should be getting and then updates them about changes because of new rules or alterations in their circumstances.
The Innovating for Ageing competition was established in January 2018 by Just Group, with support from ILC, to identify innovative solutions to the most common, intractable problems faced by vulnerable people in later life.
From the 77 submissions entered by policy experts, tech innovators and academic institutions, Ferret was chosen as one of the 12 strongest entries by the competition’s independent Advisory Board. These 12 entries have pitched to an expert judging panel and are waiting to find out if they will be among the five finalists invited to the Awards ceremony, hosted by the comedian and broadcaster David Baddiel in London in January.
Gareth Morgan, CEO at Ferret is thrilled that the hard work of the team and the system that they have developed is being recognised as an innovative solution to the problems faced by the vulnerable in society:
“We developed this idea over many years of helping people get the benefits that they have a right to, which can make an enormous difference in their day to day life.
“The ground-breaking new system makes it possible, for the first time, to let people know what’s going to change for them in the future. That lets them prepare and plan for the changes that will affect them, instead of these changes coming as a shock that can cause enormous problems.
“We are thankful to Just Group and the Advisory Board for recognising the potential of Ferret and shortlisting us. We are optimistic about reaching the final and hope to have a great time pitching our product to others who share our social purpose and getting a greater insight into how we can improve our service.”
Just – A need for Interest Serviced in the lifetime mortgages market
The number of new interest-only mortgages sold has fallen steadily in recent years following a change in lenders’ criteria. However, there is a still a high proportion of these mortgages due to mature every year until 2032. In fact, approximately 40,000 mortgages due to mature each year are held by borrowers who will be over 65 at the end of the term.
Many of these borrowers are expected to be financially vulnerable. For various reasons, including endowment shortfalls, it’s expected the majority will not have enough capital to repay their debt, leaving them at risk of losing the home they love.
Lenders may agree to extend the existing term of the mortgage, although an extension may only be granted for a relatively short period. This has the impact of delaying the inevitable as the capital balance remains outstanding and would still be due to be repaid in full at a later date.
Some lenders are happy to explore the option of converting the debt to a Capital & Interest repayment mortgage. While this may seem like the simplest solution, it’s likely to be deemed unsuitable for a large number of borrowers. This is particularly the case for those who rely solely on their state pension for income and are assessed by the lender as unable to afford the higher monthly repayments.
So what next?
One option could be an interest serviced lifetime mortgage.
Increasing consumer demand has led to much innovation in the lifetime mortgage market over recent years. There are now several lifetime mortgage lenders who offer borrowers the opportunity to service the interest, designed to help those who are used to making monthly repayments and who wish to continue to pay at least some of the accrued interest each month.
Unlike an interest-only mortgage, there’s no risk of repossession. If borrowers stop making their monthly payments, the interest is instead added to the amount they owe each month on a ‘roll-up’ basis and repaid when they (or last surviving customer if borrowing jointly) dies or goes into permanent long term care.
With our new Just For You Lifetime Mortgage, customers can choose to pay between £25 and 100% of the monthly interest for the duration of the lifetime mortgage. The product also includes interest rate reductions based on the amount of monthly interest the customer chooses to pay.
Customers can borrow either a one-off maximum lump sum, or release a smaller sum initially, with the option of releasing further sums up to the amount of a pre-agreed cash facility at a later date when needed. They’re able to make monthly interest payments on any further sums they choose to release too.
Additional features unique to Just, include the option for customers to take a payment holiday of up to three consecutive months in any 12 month period. This feature is designed to allow added flexibility, should customer have a short term need for additional cash. Outside the payment holiday, should the customer miss six monthly payments throughout the mortgage term, the mortgage will automatically convert to interest ‘roll up’. Another significant advantage for the customer, is that all the time they choose to service a proportion of the interest, they’ll have the benefit of a preferential interest rate, compared to if this option isn’t selected, making servicing the interest even more affordable.
Pure Retirement
The final quarter of 2018 proved to be an especially busy and productive time for us at Pure Retirement, which culminated last December with our much-anticipated office move. We’re all enjoying our new home, not only for the fantastic space it’s given that’s bringing out our best and is allowing us to continue our recent successes, but also the way in which it represents them and the progress we’ve made as a business. It comes off the back of the successful launch of our Sovereign suite last autumn, a range of products designed to open up equity release to as many people as possible through our most comprehensive early repayment charge policies and acceptable property guidelines yet. It marked late 2018 as a landmark period in our history, and has afforded us a strong foundation on which to build on going forward.
We’ve been pleased with the levels of interaction that we’ve seen with our new website since last year’s web refresh. Having a web presence that delivers the information our user base want and need want via a user-friendly interface and improved mobile device usability has been a point of priority for us, and to see the new platform resonating with people has been incredibly satisfying experience.
Similarly, last autumn we expanded our marketing toolkit offering to advisers by augmenting the existing materials that focus on offline mediums such as brochures and flyers with a new digital element. A mix of document-based guidance and practical assistance via means such as bespoke HTML e-mail building, the digital toolkit has proved as popular with our adviser base as its offline-centred counterpart, and it’s been pleasing to have already received requests surrounding our new services.
Last year our webinar series saw record levels of uptake, with our summer editions (focusing on the legalities of equity release and the digital marketing opportunities open to advisers, with insight from leading practitioners in their respective industries) being followed by a pair of autumn episodes which focused on two of the current talking points in the industry: the role equity release can play in long-term care provisions, and the available technological developments to help advisers make the most of the growing. We were lucky enough to benefit from the input of My Care Consultant’s Jacqueline Berry on the former, while our own Head of Technical Services, Simon Hayton, helmed the latter.
We were thrilled with the feedback that we received on the back of our autumn roadshows, with the content (provided by representatives from the Council itself, Later Life Academy, Release My Equity and My Care Consultant) really resonated with those who attended. We have plans for more in the coming year, and in the meantime we’ll be contributing to Financial Reporter’s Later Life Lending roadshows – details here – and we’ll also be present at the Glasgow FSE.
For those who might have missed it, the latest edition of the Pure-sponsored Lifetime Market Insight magazine from The Premier Equity Release Club, full of the latest industry updates, is available here.
Lastly – though by no means least – thanks to everyone who voted for us at the Mortgage Solutions Equity Release Awards and the Mortgage Finance Gazette Awards where we won Best Provider For Adviser Support and Best Lifetime Mortgage Lender, respectively. It means a lot to us to have our successes celebrated by our peers and the wider market in general, and your support is hugely appreciated.
AiR Group Announce Big Developments for Early 2019
Answers in Retirement Group (AIR Group), the Group of companies covering a range of retirement and later life services has today (23 January 2019) announced two big developments to start the year as the mean to continue.
During quarter one, AIR Group will be joined by a new Operations Director and a new Commercial Director who will be charged with developing the overall Group proposition, specifically focusing on the benefits available to members and users.
In January, Mike Taylor will join AIR Group as Operations Director. Mike has held a number of senior positions within financial services businesses, most recently as Operations Director at Holloway Friendly, and Director of Underwriting at Unum.
Towards the end of quarter one, Mike will be joined at AIR Group by Gary Little who will be taking up the position of Commercial Director. Gary is currently the Sales Director at Blacks Connect and has previously been the Commercial Director at the TMA mortgage club, and Head of Operations & Membership at the Chartered Insurance Institute/Society of Mortgage Professionals.
Both Mike and Gary will be working at Group level focusing on all AIR Group brands and helping to grow the propositions.
Stuart Wilson, Chief Executive Officer, Answers In Retirement Group, said:
“These two senior appointments are indications of our corporate ambition to drive forward the growth of the group, with special focus on member benefits. After a record-breaking 2018 for the AIR Group, we are positioned for strong strategic growth and are investing heavily in the right people who have been selected from a stellar list of applicants. Mike and Gary have been chosen because of their broad corporate management experience at senior level and their shared passion for consumer outcome in our sector. We look forward to welcoming them on board during the first quarter of this year and are confident they’ll be considerable assets to the business.”
Answers in Retirement Group have also announced the approaching launch of ‘AiR Prestige’ – a brand new, full service, para-packaging proposition for advisers seeking the right lending solutions for their older clients.
AiR Prestige has been designed to ensure advisers significantly reduce their administration burden and the time they spend processing their later life cases. By utilising the new proposition advisers can submit the client factfind via the AIR Sourcing system whereupon the case will be sourced by the Prestige team who will provide a report back detailing the best solutions for the client, covering equity release, retirement interest-only (RIO) and traditional mortgages.
The report will include the research that has been undertaken on their behalf, a KFI, a suitability template and a part-completed application.
At this point the adviser can choose to submit the case via the Equity Release Club as they would currently do or pass it fully to the AiR Prestige team who will provide full processing through to offer and completion. AiR Prestige will deal with all underwriting processes and administration, keeping the adviser fully informed and in touch with the case via a new case-tracking function which will be available via AiR Sourcing.
All advice responsibility is retained by the adviser, as is client ownership, and they receive 100% of the procuration fee for the case. The adviser will pay £249 on completion to AiR Prestige, it will be reduced for LLA members and electronic submissions to £199
As part of AiR Prestige advisers will gain access to a range of exclusive lending products plus opportunities to offer insurance, wills, LPAs, and funeral plans to clients to ensure a full and robust client outcome is delivered.
AiR Prestige is also available to mortgage advisers and IFAs who are not currently authorised to advise on equity release or mortgages. The proposition will be able to ‘match’ them with a highly-experienced adviser from the LLA or the Equity Release Club’s Platinum members.
AiR Prestige launches in FEBRUARY 2019 with a new, dedicated team of staff working out of Answers in Retirement’s Gloucester head office.
Stuart Wilson, Chief Executive Officer, Answers In Retirement Group, said:
“We are very excited to launch the Prestige initiative as the first significant development following the investment in AIR Group in 2018. This service is a nationwide commitment to support our advisers by adding real ongoing value, helping them to develop their customer’s journey.
“AiR Prestige is being launched in harmony with our national training and support programme, and at a time when older consumers are seeking first-charge borrowing options in record numbers. Our new business development team will be able to work with all advisers at any level of experience to best match a range of support options to ensure all older clients get the very best options.”
Chris Agathangelou, Commercial Director at Family Building Society, commented:
“As a true specialist in the later life lending market we are very pleased to be involved in the new AiR Prestige venture and supporting Equity Release Club members with alternative options for later life lending. Their expertise and our innovative products and flexible underwriting will help fulfil the borrowing needs of a wide range of people in or approaching retirement.”
Legal & General – 2018: Retirement lending comes of age
It’s no exaggeration to say that last year was one of remarkable growth and change in the retirement lending market, including for us at Legal & General Home Finance. 2018 saw yet more growth in the equity release market, with the equivalent of £11m of property wealth withdrawn a day between July and September.[1]
In March, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) called on our industry to offer more choice to customers who want to borrow in retirement, particularly those with interest-only mortgages. This go-ahead for Retirement Interest Only (RIO) mortgages was a significant step for retirement lending. Lenders were quick to respond, with Aldermore and Bath Building Society amongst the first to launch a RIO product.[2]
Addressing interest-only
At Legal & General, we launched our own innovative solution. Data from the FCA shows there are still 1.67 million outstanding interest-only mortgages in the UK, with around 200,000 loans maturing by 2020.[3] From listening to people with interest-only mortgages, we know that many want to continue paying their interest.
So in April, we launched our Optional Payment Lifetime Mortgage (OPLM). OPLM gives customers the chance to make monthly interest repayments in retirement, but with the key features of a traditional lifetime mortgage including fixed rates and tenure for life.
Partnerships
Over the course of 2018, we took further steps to help address the interest-only challenge. This included new partnerships with Virgin Money in August and NatWest in December. This means we can offer their interest-only customers age 55 and over our lifetime mortgage range including OPLM, which doesn’t require affordability checks.
These arrangements add to existing partnerships with Santander and The Co-operative Bank and are a collective response to the FCA’s call for more options from the mortgage industry for interest-only borrowers. Our retirement lending solutions are now potentially available to customers accounting for 38% of the UK’s interest-only lending.
Investing in intermediaries
It’s no secret more people are looking to access their property wealth in later life.[1] But despite the success of lifetime mortgages, the retirement lending and mainstream mortgage markets remain largely separate – even how advisers source their products is different.
Last year, we committed to our strategy of bringing these markets closer together and supporting more mortgage intermediaries to advise of retirement lending. In May we announced our first step in this strategy, a new partnership with Twenty7Tec, meaning our lifetime mortgages are now included on Mortgage Source. They are the first sourcing system provider to let advisers compare standard residential, second charge and equity release products together in one system.
Innovation
Listening to Britain’s retirees has shown us that homeowners are compromising their retirement plans because they are having to make their income go further, for longer.[1]
Our research helped us launch our Income Lifetime Mortgage in November. It’s still a loan secured against a customer’s home but instead of a lump sum, it offers a tax-free initial loan followed by a regular fixed-term monthly income. It’s designed to help customers maintain their standard of living in retirement and afford little luxuries such as meals out with friends and treating the grandchildren. There’s clearly a segment of older homeowners who want to use housing equity but also want the discipline of a regular income, and we believe this product meets that need.
After a year of significant change for retirement lending, in December Legal & General Home Finance reached a milestone £3 billion of total lending since entering the market in 2015. We’re now responsible for 28% of new lifetime mortgages in the UK, but we can’t become complacent. That’s why we are keeping up this momentum over the year ahead, helping people have the best retirement they can.
