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Lenders have made a good start with green mortgages – Halifax Intermediaries video debate
The moves lenders have made to offer green mortgages which incentivise improving housing stock are a good start but more can be done, Kevin Roberts, director at Legal and General Mortgage Club has said.
Speaking on a Mortgage Solutions video debate in association with Halifax Intermediaries, Roberts said: “I think lenders have made a really good start in terms of innovation, but there’s a really long way to go.
“We now need to start demanding from lenders that we get much more focus on that. It’s not just a discount for A to C, whilst that’s nice, it’s not necessarily helping the issue.”
He suggested that there needed to be help available so people could improve their home’s EPC rating and get the finance for it.
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He added: “Maybe we can be more creative around affordability measures if it’s for green [mortgages].
“Maybe we can have much more cashback, maybe we can have more marketing. Some consistency, maybe, from the lenders would be really helpful. Education is always good – if lenders could collaborate a little bit more.”
Bukky Bird, group sustainability director at Barratt Developments, said “the dream” was for every conversation a homeowner had about financing their home to consider the benefits of being energy efficient.
She also proposed the idea of “genuinely impactful financial products” which factor in the savings that can be made when making a home more efficient.
Andy Mason, head of strategic partnerships and housing at Lloyds Banking Group, said he wished to continue having “great” and “practical” conversations around green mortgages.
He said Halifax was working on improving the quality of its backbook from an average EPC rating of D to C.
He also said the bank was looking at piloting products to encourage people to retrofit their homes and improve energy efficiency.
Watch the video embedded [7:01] hosted by Shekina Tuahene, commercial editor at Mortgage Solutions, featuring Andy Mason, head of strategic partnerships and housing at Lloyds Banking Group, Bukky Bird, group sustainability director at Barratt Developments and Kevin Roberts, director of Legal and General Mortgage Club.
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