Brokers should consider if they would lend their own money on cases they package – Castle Trust

When asked about lack of information in some applications, Castle Trust sales director Robert Oliver said: “If you’re a mortgage broker and you understand what a lender wants, it is around sustainability and plausibility of the application.  

“But ultimately you’re sat there as a broker looking at a case the question that’s always going to be asked is ‘would you lend your own money?’. If the answer is ‘no you wouldn’t,’ which it might be in certain circumstances, you’ve got to ask yourself the question ‘okay so what would the lender want to see that enables us to lend the money?’ 

“If you would lend your own money, then obviously it’s an easy transaction.” 

Speaking on a panel debate on Specialist Lending Solutions TV, Oliver said a lack of knowledge was an extra barrier for brokers who were new to the holiday let market and putting cases together. 

He added: “The difficulty is, when you enter a new part of the market, sometimes brokers don’t fully understand what a lender will require. Ultimately from our perspective, we’re looking at the asset. What’s the asset quality? Where is it located? 

“We’re going to do it as a lender, so you as the broker probably need to have a little look yourself. Do that work before it comes to the lender.” 

Damian Cain, director at Complete FS, said another commonly made mistake was around the understanding of holiday let income. 

“My advice would be, if you have a holiday let application, make sure that you do some background work with a local Association of Residential Lettings Agents (ARLA) agent who can give you some advice on what the likely yield on that property is going to be among the three seasons – low season, mid season and high season.  

“Armed with those figures the rest of the information is very similar to a buy-to-let case and we should be able to place it quite accurately,” he added. 

Watch the video below [9:43] hosted by Shekina Tuahene, commercial editor of Mortgage Solutions and Specialist Lending Solutions, featuring Robert Oliver, sales director at Castle Trust; Dak Lam, senior associate at Sirius Property Finance and Damian Cain, director of Complete FS.