Adapting to a customer-driven mortgage sector will be the biggest challenge banks and intermediaries will face, according to Santander’s managing director of mortgages, Miguel Sard.
Speaking at the Legal & General Mortgage Club Live Conference in London yesterday (5 October), Mr Sard said customer expectations were becoming increasingly influenced by the services offered by tech firms such as Google and Facebook.
Brokers and banks will need to adapt to these challenges by collaborating with other industries or risk losing business to more customer-friendly providers.
Mr Sard said: “I am much more worried about customer evolution than base rate or the buy-to-let market or many other of the drivers we talk about day in, day out.”
He warned: “If we do not adapt ourselves to what the customer is becoming, we are going to have trouble.”
Mr Sard said digital customers were much more likely to switch providers if their expectations were not being met, in contrast to more traditional borrowers.
He also said they were happy to share their data, as long as they were confident that doing so would benefit them.
And with artificial intelligence becoming more and more sophisticated, customers are increasingly happy to interact with machines during the mortgage process, he said.
Mr Sard said intermediaries currently dominate the mortgage market because they simplify the customer journey - but brokers and lenders would need to continue to focus on making things easier for the customer and provide a personalised service.
In a panel discussion following Mr Sard’s presentation, Barclays director of mortgage products Craig Calder said lenders and intermediaries would need to “keep one eye on tech”.
He said: “Artificial intelligence will arrive at some stage and that will change the way we operate. We need to keep ahead of that.”
NatWest Intermediary Solutions head of intermediary mortgages Graham Felstead said: “There is room for the traditional broker, but they are going to have to evolve.”
He said the role of banks was not to compete with brokers but to work in the best interests of the customer.
simon.allin@ft.com
