New life for later-life lending
Putting a figure on the size of the later-life lending market helps the industry understand what has developed and more importantly to understand what will continue to develop as the need for borrowing in later life is not going away.
At Key Group, one of the areas that we feel is likely to grow – especially with the consumer duty on the horizon – is partnerships between different advisers.
Whether they are independent financial advisers, equity release specialists or tax planning consultants, each group will have customer needs that are better met by trusted specialists in their respective fields.
While the idea of someone who is able to provide truly holistic advice might seem sensible, the practicalities mean that this is very hard to achieve.
However, adviser training and qualifications do need to evolve to ensure that there are better hand-offs between practices and a deeper understanding of when this needs to happen.
Identifying the potential of this £153.9bn market is just the first step, we now need to consider how we solve some of the challenges facing us and at the same time ensure that good customer outcomes remain the focus as the sector lives up to its potential.
Stuart Wilson is corporate marketing director at Key Group
