For the second year running, Paradigm has revealed it will see completions exceeding normal market growth, up 49 per cent on last year.
With mortgage volumes increasing month on month, Bob Hunt, chief executive of Paradigm Mortgage Services, said it is hard to feel anything other than optimistic about the future.
Organic recruitment of new partner members continued apace in 2014, he told FTAdviser, while cost/income ratios were also improving month by month.
Applications to Paradigm’s mortgage/protection club are running at 10 new firms a month, Mr Hunt added, despite the challenges created by such growth.
Reflecting on 2014, he said the Mortgage Market Review had dominated the last 12 months, but had reaped rewards for advisers.
He said: “We acknowledge that the MMR process has not always been a smooth one for intermediaries, especially in understanding lenders’ various interpretations of client affordability; however it doesn’t surprise me at all to see firms positively adapting to the various changes and thriving in the new environment.
“A brief look at 2014 lending figures and early 2015 predictions confirms the channel shift that is happening in favour of the intermediary.
For the overall mortgage market, gross lending looks likely to break the £200bn barrier this year and the intermediary channel will account for approximately 65 per cent of gross sales, stated Mr Hunt.
“However, the picture for 2015 looks even better – our estimation is that gross lending could touch £225bn, with the intermediary share of this being closer to a staggering 70 to 75 per cent.
“This is a significant turn-around from the very challenging days post-credit crunch and is a huge positive for intermediary firms and distributors such as ourselves.”
emma.hughes@ft.com
