In the last in a video series of four in association with The Mortgage Lender, Greg Cunnington said: “I have a client I’ve dealt with for ten years. He runs a cool business, he designs restaurants, shops and bars all over the world. He took six months off because there was no work globally and it was costing him money to keep the office open. He’s now back up again, with record numbers coming through in Hong Kong. He thought getting a mortgage would be really easy.”
Cunnington explained the client’s existing lender is a top six provider who won’t take the case ‘in a million years’ due to the work break, despite the fact the client’s a great credit risk.
He added that some mainstream lenders are stepping up for the self-employed including Halifax which was doing a lot of ‘common sense underwriting’ on self-employed cases, also mentioning HSBC and Barclays, but TML’s sales and product director Steve Griffiths outlined the specialist lender’s point of difference.
He said: “The example Greg gave there about the customer who closed up for a bit and had a hole in his recent set of accounts. A limited number of mainstream guys would say yes, that’s not a problem. What that means is, as a specialist lender you want to be number three on the recommendation list who will definitely do the deal. I guess that’s the space we’re moving back into again. When you are looking at Covid-income impacted clients, you’re looking at a very short list of mainstream lenders – maybe just one.”
For more on the debate, watch the video below.
Our video panellists include Steve Griffiths sales and product director, The Mortgage Lender, host and group editor of Mortgage Solutions, Victoria Hartley, Greg Cunnington director lender relationships and new homes at Alexander Hall and Andrew Montlake (pictured), managing director Coreco Mortgage Brokers and chairman of AMI.
Sponsored content in association with The Mortgage Lender.
