The media and the market

kenshaz

Conrad wrote: »

To moneysave without considering its effects is to my mind short sighted.

We all ought to think about the effects of our desire to save money.

It is absolutely the case that our desire for cheap goods and services is only sustainable where the worker at the end of the chain accepts very low rates of pay ($100 per month in China, a lot less in Vietnam and so on).

When we smuggly pat ourselves on the back for finding an oh so cheap mobile phone, lets spare a thought for the children of Angola and other places, forced to work 16 hour days at the expense of an education to dig up the raw materials used in thier manufacture.

When we demand ever cheaper insurance lets think about the knock on effect to call centre income levels.

Ive always lived by the code - do unto others as you would want done to yourself.

By all means shop around, but lets not always get so hung up on cost and price. Dont expect advisers to work merely for commision that is only paid if the client does'nt pull out at the last moment.
Would we expect teachers to only be paid if the kids pass thier exams?

This site is about Moneysaving hence the name
.
Why do we need advisers there are excellent wizards that will perform the task ?

We live in a democratic society in a free market ,look to other governments and states regarding exploitation,we have choice ,please do not deny us freedom within the market

The analogy in respect to teachers ,we should be attempting to create well rounded,well adjusted individuals ,not the ability to pass exams ,there is so much more to life .Perhaps we could pay them in relation to the contribution that the children they educate make to society..

I like your code,and perhaps I can see the direction from which you come ,but stand in the shoes of others is mine ,and I imagine the feelings of FTBs with little or no cash ,contributing to the running of the 4WD vehicle parked out-side the mortgage brokers office.When they probably could have found a better deal themselves.

homer_j_3

The media control what we do more than ever so it doesn't surprise me that everyday we are seeing bad news after next about the housing and mortgage market as this is the thing that sells at the moment - not so long ago it was all about the incompetence of the Home Office or the amount of Knife crime etc.

The fact remains that we have seen unbelievable and unsustainable growth in our house prices. It was always a "when" rather than an "if" and all those people now seeing the decline in lending and house prices are becoming more confident that everything is going to fall over and collapse. They may be right, they may just see some restoration of reality where house prices drop by 20% and then we level out - i.e a period of correction rather than crash.

Looking at lending, I believe there is lots of money out there to lend and because of the uncertainty, the lenders are now lending less on higher profit per deal basis. It is because the top 4 are quite happy at the moment to sit back and look for quality business and take higher profit, that there is no urgency from anywhere else to try and take market share back. Upto this morning, I believed that it would take around 6 months to see 1 of the top 4 make a move to try and bite of the market share and HSBC have shown their intentions. I doubt that this will be enough on its own to stimulate lending again but it shows that lenders are maybe looking at ways to test the water again.

From a point of a mortgage professional, my message is that there are still deals out there but they are just becoming more selective that they have been known to be over the last few years. We have to adapt and I look to the banks way of doing business, I would rather focus on quality of business rather than quantity.

I do not believe that a tailored solution can be given on the basis of 1hrs conversation and a 10 minute look on sourcing software with a quick adjustment of the filters. Those advisers who have relied on quantity will be the first out of the field as lead generation companies report the 20-30% conversion rate now being 5-15% conversion rates. The number of High LTV customers with reducing/correcting house prices will be stuck and therefore no remortgage opportunities. The business will become harder to come by and only those that have prepared by ensuring that their cost cutting is by timesaving and looking for the right calibre of client who genuinely wants advice rather than to spend 4 or 5 hours shopping around to try and take the advice and make sense of it to work out what they feel is best.

I am quite open to the independent way of doing business - charging a fee but refunding the commission but I am totally against charging a fee and keeping the commission - that is fundamentally wrong but with some companies, it is a necessity due to the way they are structured and have their overheads.

Brokers are a waste of space to anybody who is confident that they understand everything they need to know to arrange their mortgage but they are critical for people who do not have the knowledge, know how and/or time to do this. There is no grandeur in what we do although I am very proud of what I do.

Just to add the folowing comment about the above post

This site is about Moneysaving hence the name .
Why do we need advisers there are excellent wizards that will perform the task.

A wizard will not do the job to the same standard as a decent adviser, of course it will replace the order takers of the industry but will not replace the advice givers.

Moneysaving is more than not paying for something upfront or getting it as cheaply as possible. Moneysaving is about ensuring you do not waste your money and it could be that an adviser charges their client £500 and gives them the advice that will recoup this money back and more overall over what they would have done without that advice.

Dan_Collins_2

baby_boomer wrote: »

Well that's all right then :rotfl:

Mortgage brokers in India in 2010. There's an idea.

What the ?????????

dunstonh

This site is about Moneysaving hence the name

Yet we see many people that think they are saving money end up paying more. Its easy to save the pennies when you can see them but its just easy to lose the pounds when you cant see it straight away.

Good advice is worth every penny paid.

Why do we need advisers there are excellent wizards that will perform the task ?

The FSA has trialled a number of flow chart style self help things in the past. Problem is that in 2/3rds of the cases the outcome was the wrong advice. There are scenarios which are simple but one change of information can give a totally different outcome.

kenshaz

[FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif][/FONT][FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif] NO MORTGAGE ADVISER REQUIRED FOR THIS ONE


HSBC offers mortgage lifeline
HSBC is exploiting turmoil in the mortgage market with an offer to match homeowners' existing deals. The bank's offer targets the 1.4 million who are coming off cheap fixed-rate deals this year and face sharp increases in rates from their existing lenders as a result of the credit crunch. On Monday, Abbey was the last lender to pull its 100 per cent loans. Meanwhile, Nationwide recently hiked rates on its two year fixes from 4.5 per cent to 7.5 per cent. HSBC's "Rate Matcher" deal is only available for the next five weeks and for a maximum loan of £250,000. There will be a fee, which HSBC says should be below £999 for three quarters of customers.
[/FONT]

Dan_Collins_2

kenshaz wrote: »

[FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif] NO MORTGAGE ADVISER REQUIRED FOR THIS ONE[/FONT]


[FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif]HSBC offers mortgage lifeline [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif]HSBC is exploiting turmoil in the mortgage market with an offer to match homeowners' existing deals. The bank's offer targets the 1.4 million who are coming off cheap fixed-rate deals this year and face sharp increases in rates from their existing lenders as a result of the credit crunch. On Monday, Abbey was the last lender to pull its 100 per cent loans. Meanwhile, Nationwide recently hiked rates on its two year fixes from 4.5 per cent to 7.5 per cent. HSBC's "Rate Matcher" deal is only available for the next five weeks and for a maximum loan of £250,000. There will be a fee, which HSBC says should be below £999 for three quarters of customers. [/FONT]

Yeah its very good, although the fee can be from £500-£5000 80% ltv max, no more than 250k. It has a bottom cap of 4.5ish and I it will have to be a nice clean case.

No capitals needed here, shouting is rude!

itsnever2lateisit?

homer_j wrote: »

<snip>
I do not believe that a tailored solution can be given on the basis of 1hrs conversation and a 10 minute look on sourcing software with a quick adjustment of the filters. <snip>
I am quite open to the independent way of doing business - charging a fee but refunding the commission but I am totally against charging a fee and keeping the commission - that is fundamentally wrong but with some companies, it is a necessity due to the way they are structured and have their overheads. <snip>

Couldnt agree more, as a customer, on two previous occassions that I have used a broker, I have always gone to one that charges a fee up front, and will refund the commission. I always start the convo by asking what the top rate of commission they receive, then tell them that I want to pay a fee 1/16th% below the top rate of commission. In this way I feel more confident that the product offered is the best for me rather than the best for the broker, not that I thought ill of the broker, but it made me more confident, and should I use the services of a broker again will look for the same fee based non commission service

Dylanwing

My Broker (Fee charging) did a fantastic job 3 years ago, when we had a very difficult case, my income was temporarily low, but we had decent equity, ending up with SPML as a Near Prime 'Liar loan'. Our fixed deal ends shortly, so we used the same Broker, and this time, we were a very easy case, and have an Offer of a 5 Year Fixed, fast-tracked by Abbey. First time he was more than worth every penny, and this time, he saved an awful lot of time and hassle, so no complaints. And we have free solicitors, more than off-setting any fee.

chappers

I have to agree brokers are the ones operating day to day in the market, they are constantly searching for clients so should have apretty good idea Of what is available. now I'm sure they sometimes miss a better deal or maybe sometimes show preference to certain lenders, in my opinion they should always be the beginning and end of your search for amortgage just not always the middle.
If a broker gave me a list of possible mortgages that fitted my criteria I would take them away do my own research and then go back to them, if i had in the meantime sourced something of my own i would still place that mortgage through the broker, a) it's only polite to give them the business after the work they have done and b)they take away all the hassle from yourself.

In response to how the mortgage market is going I read something in the paper today which reminded me of the old days where you got your mortgage from a building society you saved with the BS until you had enough for a deposit, they then gave you a mortgage which was used to buy a house, not a car, a speedboat or to get yourself out of debt and you stayed with that mortgage for 25 years until you had paid it off.
They used the savings people put in to lend to those borrowing and didn't rely so heavily on borrowing from other banks.

How quaint

Bismarck

I remember those days too....people used to know their bank manager too and they were a respected pillar of the community. Sometimes, the staff stayed in the branch all their working lives and if you wanted something you could call your local branch and speak to someone who you'd actually met. Now that is quaint.