In the second charge division, we were delighted to have contributed to the £500 million of completions that Brightstar as a company has written since 2011. The importance of this sector of the specialist market continues to grow as rates remain low and we are seeing more brokers casting about for alternative sources of finance as remortgage requests are becoming harder to fulfil.
So we are seeing more converts to the second charge alternative as first charge lenders continue to struggle to balance pragmatism with the need to interpret the essence of the new affordability rules.
What I cannot stress enough is that second charge is not something that can be ignored in 2014. I am not saying that because I lead the second charge team at Brightstar, but because the regulator is on record stating that if a broker has a client who is looking to capital raise then it must be clear that a second charge quote has been researched as conscientiously as one for remortgage.
For those reluctant brokers who are still working on what they remember of the average second charge loan of pre-credit crunch days, I can assure you that you will not recognise the product of today.
We have proved time and again to sceptical brokers just how effective a second charge loan can be and where in fact a second charge loan is actually the better option. Brokers wishing to ignore the regulator run the risk of not only seeing their files picked apart by the regulator in the future, but also having a client who becomes aware of an alternative of which he or she was unaware and we know how the claims companies will gleefully jump on any perceived breach which they can exploit. So even if brokers are still not convinced, how much would it hurt to ensure they have at least included a second charge quote?
You never know you might be pleasantly surprised as well as safe from retrospective claims of negligence at a time in the future when memories of decisions made are not so reliable.
Bradley Moore is director of second charge lending at Brightstar Financial
