To Broke or not to Broke, that is the question. Or is it?

Ever since I joined the world of Mortgage Broking, leaving behind a successful career in the training arm of a well-known (State owned) bank, I have had my eyes well and truly opened.

For context, I spent nearly 18 years at the bank and mostly worked within the mortgage business where I went from advising, to managing a team of advisers as well as training new advisers and managers. I thought I knew a lot about mortgages, I thought banks were the best places to get them and I thought brokers weren’t the best place to go due to inaccurate press making it sound like they do things based on what commission they would earn.

How wrong I was.

Now don’t get me wrong, and just to put it out there, I cannot say all brokers are saints but similarly I cannot say all mortgage advisers in financial institutions are saints either, but I do know there is a clear difference in the service they offer.

One of the things that struck me personally when I left the safety of my corporate bubble, with all of the staff benefits I had in place, was upon leaving and navigating my way in my new surroundings it became abundantly clear I was under protected. I had a shortfall on my mortgage related life insurance cover (Which was a joint policy) and we also had no critical illness cover. I now had no income protection cover, nor any accident protection cover.

I was lucky I had these benefits in place but also unlucky in the sense of where I worked the protection proposition was that of self service. A kind of ‘Here’s a quote for life cover, you decide if you want it and if you do, apply online yourself’. This is not a helpful approach, and doesn’t look after the best interests of clients. Nor did it look after me as I wasn’t offered a full protection review either.

Until I left the company and realised I had to get this sorted out, here was someone who thought they knew it all and suddenly found out they didn’t.

What worries me is there are so many people out there who are under insured and depending on who you speak to in the mortgage adviser lottery you might walk away with the mortgage you want but still incredibly under insured.

Gone are the days of selling policies for the sake of it, what it is about now (and should have always been) is highlighting the needs of clients to ensure they walk away with the biggest financial commitment they are ever going to make, fully covered.

Imagine a world where you have gone into an estate agents and found the property of your dreams, you’ve spoken to a mortgage adviser, in house, and obtained an agreement in principle before making your offer, your offer is accepted and you progress your application with your broker who has a thorough discussion with you to fully understand both your mortgage and protection needs and you walk away with a recommendation for a fully protected mortgage, and after you broker has managed the steps along the way for you, you move into your new home with full peace of mind.

This isn’t folly, this is here and now.

A mortgage broker will give you that. Admittedly you will have to pay your broker a ‘broker fee’ but you get what you pay for, as they say. Brokers source through a large number of different lenders (50 where I am now based) to get you the most competitive mortgage deal, and review your protection needs.

That’s 49 more lenders than that of going to your high street bank, shopping around is done based on your personal circumstances, whatever your financial story in order to get you the best mortgage deal and to protect what matters the most to you whilst you are in your home.

Imagine sorting out your mortgage where the adviser doesn’t have a protection conversation with you, scary thought really.

By the way, I did get my insurances addressed. My wife and I are now fully covered and our family are fully protected in the event of anything happening to either of us. I also reviewed my house insurance and have since taken out a policy which was ￡7 per month less than what I was already paying, and it is a much more comprehensive policy.

I wouldn’t have got that working in the bank.

YOUR HOME MAY BE REPOSSESSED IF YOU DO NOT KEEP UP REPAYMENTS ON YOUR MORTGAGE