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Fluent’s Wheeldon slams negative attitude to seconds sector

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  • 20/04/2017
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Fluent’s Wheeldon slams negative attitude to seconds sector
The head of second charge broker and packager Fluent for Advisers has hit out at “naysayers” for talking the market down following the Mortgage Credit Directive (MCD).

Tim Wheeldon (pictured), chief operating officer of Fluent said the negative attitude from some corners of the market was unfounded as the sector was experiencing an “upward trend”.

Figures from the Finance & Leasing Association released earlier this month showed new second charge business fell to £864m in the year to February, down by 2% on the previous year.

In September, Mortgage Solutions revealed that customers often faced a lottery for the fees they would pay to access a second charge loan.

TFC Homeloans managing director Nigel Payne believes it is these fees which are holding the sector back from growing in use. Meanwhile, Association of Mortgage Intermediaries chief executive Robert Sinclair said it was necessary for mortgage networks to engage with second charge lending if it was to ever to gain traction.

Wheeldon said: “Much of the negative commentary has been generated in the wake of the first anniversary of the MCD going live. Some pundits have tried to seize on the lower figures a year on as proof that secured loans would remain a peripheral player in the market.

“I have always maintained that just because MCD theoretically levelled the playing field and provided compelling reasons for the intermediary community to embrace secured loans when looking for capital raising options, it did not follow that there would be an immediate stampede. The sector was always going to have to have to engage proactively with intermediaries rather than, as some distributors did, expect the business to come rolling in straight away.”

He noted that specialists were in no doubt that focussing on education and creating a proper business case to brokers was the way forward.

“My hope is that the naysayers will think a little more before adopting a negative attitude towards the sector when based on such a small amount of data,” he added.

 

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