The lender said that the new structure would “further enhance relationships with key networks and clubs, as well as the broader intermediary community”. Louisa Sedgwick, mortgages commercial director who joined the firm in March this year, will assume responsibility for both the sales and product teams.
And Paragon has created two national account manager roles in the sales team to “bolster relationships with networks and clubs”. Jane Simpson, managing director of TBMC which closed operations in July this year, will take on the role of national account manager. She had worked at TBMC for 18 years, taking on the role of managing director in 2015.
Sally Wright, most recently head of intermediary distribution at Hampshire Trust Bank, will become the other national account manager. Wright joined HTB in 2021 as head of propositions for specialist mortgages and took on the role of intermediary distribution head in 2022. Before HTB, she was at Vida Homeloans for around five years, and One Savings Bank before that.
Jason Wilde will stay in his current role as national sales manager and will be supported by existing regional sales teams.
Hulme to retire at year-end
Moray Hulme, Paragon’s mortgage sales director, will be retiring from the business at the end of the year. He took on the role of mortgage sales director in 2019, and prior to that led the regional sales team for over a decade.
Hulme said: “I am extremely proud to have helped Paragon become the UK’s leading specialist buy-to-let lender during my 36 years with the company.
“It was exciting to be part of a new market when buy-to-let launched in the mid-1990s and subsequently to see the sector develop into the mature market it is today, supporting the growth of the private rented sector and providing a home for millions of people.”
He continued: “I am looking forward to spending time pursuing my interests, as well as keeping in contact with the many friends I have made in the industry over the past three decades.”
Restructure will ‘optimise’ sales and operations functions
Richard Rowntree, Paragon Bank’s managing director of mortgages, said that the firm was “making a significant investment in its buy-to-let mortgages business – through our digital proposition, people and processes – to improve customer and broker experience and position the bank for the next phase of growth.”
He added: “The changes we are implementing today will optimise our sales and operations functions and position the bank for the future.”
Rowntree added that Hulme had helped Paragon become “one of the most highly-regarded buy-to-let lenders in the market today and I thank him for his dedicated service to Paragon over the past 36 years”.
“Moray is well-known and well-liked in the industry and we wish him well for the future” he said.
Sedgwick continued that Paragon had an “excellent reputation amongst the broker community and we want to expand our network to become a lender of choice across the market”.
She said: “Ensuring we have a sales function that can forge new relationships and is fully aligned to today’s modern distribution network is a key element of that journey and I’m excited that we are putting in place a structure to build on the excellent work undertaken over recent years.”
