Speaking to this publication, Lisa Stones (pictured right), operations director for Mortgage 1st, said that opportunities for brokers were in specialist lending and specialist advice.

“It’s almost no good just to be in one lane anymore… it’s under that Consumer Duty umbrella that you are offering the absolute right advice to your client, not just staying in that lane because it’s a lane you know.

“Whether that is referring out or whether you do it in house, but I think that’s where the opportunities lie,” she added.

Mortgage 1st launched a specialist lending arm at the start of this year, named Specialist 1st, which is an appointed representative (AR) for Connect for Intermediaries.

The division can offer advice on complex buy to let (BTL), adverse credit, second charge lending, commercial purchases, development finance and bridging finance.

Sponsored

Mind over mortgages: why we need to look after intermediaries’ mental health

Sponsored by Halifax Intermediaries

Jon Stones (pictured left), managing director at Mortgage 1st, said that it was “seeing a lot of a lot of growth in there and it is very eye-opening”.

He continued: “The specialist lending market is a very different market to the standard vanilla residential market that we are used to, so a lot of our focus has kind of been on that side of the market.”

Mrs Stones said that the launch of the specialist lending division meant that it had the “ability to offer clients everything” in house. Previously, the business had used third-party referral relationships, but Mr Stones said that “you lose that element of control” with cases.

Mr Stones said that what Specialist 1st was seeing was mainly bridging, second charges and commercial, but it was also able to handle more complex cases.

“Our advisers are great advisers, but a lot of them don’t have specialist lending knowledge, so the big key piece for us is the kind of education of the Mortgage 1st and Peak Mortgage advisers of what other options there are out there,” he noted.

Mortgage 1st acquired Peak Mortgages last year, which brought around 13 advisers into the business. Mr Stones said this move had “worked really well” and had played into its “growth ambitions”.

Mr Stones said that he had “lost track of the [number] of companies that have reached out for a conversation” since the acquisition, but that “nothing was on the horizon right now”. However, he said that it “certainly would look at doing it again if it was the right fit”.

Mrs Stones said that, previously, specialist leads may have come across desks of advisers and then been passed over as the specialist knowledge wasn’t there, so it was a “huge opportunity for us as a business to offer that cross section of advice to clients”.

 

Protection division made ‘massive difference’

Mortgage 1st also brought out a protection arm in 2022, bringing on Dave Corbett to spearhead the division.

Mr Stones said that most of its advisers were mortgage and protection advisers, but mortgages tended to dominate the conversation previously.

He noted that when he was an adviser, the protection conversations he had would have been “limited to a policy to cover the mortgage, and if the budget was there, a little bit of critical illness”. However, the protection space is a “lot more specialist nowadays”.

Mr Stones said the protection division was partially to offer a “Consumer Duty solution” so it was “making sure that every single client was having the proper protection conversations” and to work with existing advisers to upskill and get more knowledge to do multiple policies or giving that option to pass that onto an expert.

He said that launching the brand had made a “massive difference” in the level of policies sold, with premiums increasing and it becoming more common for a client to have three to five different policies as opposed to just one.

“It’s quality and quantity, which was important. It wasn’t just about doing more policies. It’s doing quality advice,” Mrs Stones added.

Mr Stones noted that the most used insurers had changed as well and that it was reviewing protection needs more constantly to make sure they still fit, as client needs can change.

 

Mortgage 1st ‘always looking to grow’

Mr Stones said that, looking ahead, it was “always looking to grow”, adding that growth and building business was “what excites me at the end of the day”.

He continued: “I want to grow into one of the biggest in the industry, and not just on headcount. You can have 100 advisers, but they’re all doing crap business levels.”

However, Mr Stones said that is “ensuring that you grow for the right reason” and “building foundations of the business properly”. Looking at protection and specialist lending divisions, they noted that it was offering the best advice for their customers and it was a good opportunity for their brokers.

Mrs Stones added that the “biggest thing” that had helped with its success as a mainstream broker and also on specialist lending and protection was being a family-run firm that “genuinely care[s]”.

“We want to keep that whilst growing, and that’s the challenge, because the… more you grow, it becomes more and more difficult to have those personal relationships with staff, so that’s why we are steady with growth,” she noted.