Mortgage News
Mortgage Mutterings: The week that was 25 – 29 October 2010
This is the Mortgage Solutions weekly talk back page, where we pick the best online comments and letters to the editor on the big stories of the week to give you a flavour of what the industry is really thinking.
You can take another look at the week’s news and we’ll round up the stand-out, most thought-provoking or unmissable comments posted after stories or sent straight through to the editor.
Comment any time on the Mortgage Solutions website and you could feature in next week’s Mortgage Mutterings.
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Newcastle launches 90% mortgage deals 25 October 2010
Posted online
Well done Newcastle Building Society, this is a positive step. There are not many lenders in this area the market. Let’s have a reaction from the market
Episode 6: What’s next for the industry? : Powered by Partnership podcast from Newcastle for Intermediaries
Sponsored by Newcastle for Intermediaries
Adrian McClaren, mortgage specialist, Yorkshire
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Miliband admits Labour’s regulatory failures 25 October 2010
Posted online
After admitting that his Labour government’s strategy was 100% wrong for well over a decade, surely he is the last person to be critical of the coalition government’s strategy to get us out of the financial mess that he (along with his accomplices) caused.
Iain
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UK posts faster than expected growth of 0.8% 26 October 2010
Posted online
This is another piece of evidence that Osborne’s Spending Review is needlessly harsh. The UK’s high levels of debt are not affecting our recovery, so there is no need to cut so quick.
McCloud
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House price slump saves thief from jail 28 October 2010
Posted online
I can’t believe this guy would rather go to prison for ten years than sell the family home. Make him sell his house and do ten years community service. Does this idiot not realise the true cost of his crimes to his victims and the tax payer?
Hard working tax payers are having to sell their homes every day and go through the heartache of moving thir families into rented homes due to financial distress. They don’t steal and have a drug habit.
Rick Tingey
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Hot topic of the week – why don’t consumers like advisers? 29 October 2010
Posted online
There are many reasons why some consumers, although not all, do not like advisers. We have 1200 customers who obviously like us very much judging by the fact that we exist almost solely on their referrals with minimal advertising. The industry though is not blameless and we don’t have to rehearse all the reasons why; better just to make sure they don’t happen again. If I thought RDR, as proposed, was the solution I would support it but it isn’t and therefore I don’t.
Part of the reason why advisers are not universally liked is just down to the fact that some consumers, it has to be said, are just plain mean and narrow-minded. They view paying for advice as a zero-sum game whereby, if you are earning, they are losing. They don’t look at what they gain from it; they just look at your commission disclosure and view that as a ‘loss’ to them….
Our Lords and Masters at the FSA of course encourage such attitudes. One need only look at their Money Made Clear brochures which stress ‘no selling’.
Selling, despite what Sants & co may think, is no bad thing. Ask the recently bereaved widower to whose wife I sold a £400k LTA with which he now brings up his children or my former classmate to whom I sold Critical Illness Cover who recently benefited from a payout for breast cancer. But still Sants et al decry us and, using our own money, propagandise against us. The recent idiocy about illustrating the total cost of life cover over the entire period of the policy will, of course, make matters worse.
I wonder why they do that? I wonder why we let them?
Neil F Liversidge
Posted online
What causes consumers concern is this: they know they don’t get something for nothing and the only way that we get paid is by way of commission. Therefore, they have to be sold a product and the adviser gets paid from the product provider without them having any control over that remuneration.
I cannot think of any other industry or profession dealing with the public that proceeds in this way. It is this unique delivery and remuneration method which disturbs clients at least until it is explained to them by honest, straightforward advisers.
RDR has it flaws but hopefully non-paying clients will become a thing of the past. Hardworking advisers deserve better, whatever their current remuneration method.
Ken Hayden