Finance and Coffee: Friday Wrap

Finance and Coffee sat down with Ryan Gair, CEO from Rate Money, discussing the lender's rapid growth and unique business model since its founding in 2019.Rate Money has experienced exponential growth, escalating from approximately 15 franchises to 41 across the Eastern seaboard (Queensland, New South Wales, and Victoria). Their current goal is to reach 55 "high-performing" franchisees, with expansion planned for South Australia and other key locations. The company reports over $11 billion in total settlements since inception, with $9.7 billion settled on their own product, and $4.3 billion of funds under management.The core of Rate Money's strategy is specialisation. They exclusively focus on AltDoc (Low Doc) and self-employed lending, differentiating themselves from competitors who offer a wider, less specialised product range. This niche focus helps streamline their marketing, messaging, and target clientele.Rate Money operates as a mortgage manager, allowing them to offer bespoke products not available through third-party channels. Key examples include:Alt Doc Loans for self-employed AustraliansConstruction Low Doc Product: They were one of the first to market with this highly sought-after product.One-Year Tax Return Product: Designed to compete with major lenders while catering specifically to the self-employed customer.Customer-Centric Fees: Their prime Low Doc products typically feature no application fee, no valuation fee, and no risk fee, providing a streamlined and predictable process for the customer.Significant Growth and FocusExclusive Products and Unique Value📢 Immediate Opportunity: Rate Money is Actively Seeking BrokersA major takeaway from the interview is Rate Money's current recruitment drive. They are looking for experienced brokers (typically 2-5 years in the industry) who are ready to take the next step and grow their business into a high-performing franchise.Rate Money Head Office is positioned purely to support its franchisees, offering comprehensive assistance in:Infrastructure: Setting up the necessary systems and processes.Compliance: Providing full training and support to ensure all deals are processed correctly.Team Building: Assistance in building out sales and credit/admin support teams.Business Development: Extensive sales, marketing, and local area marketing training, including access to B2C leads from an upcoming major media push.The company views its relationship with franchisees as a true business partnership, providing the tools and products needed for brokers to stand out and build a sustainable business within the profitable AltDoc space. They even noted that several brokers who previously referred business to Rate Money have converted to become successful franchisees themselves.

Finance Talk with Peter White (FBAA), Julian Wills (F&C Compliance Guy) and Ray Regmi from Ryker CapitalTopics:*Rev NSW Payroll Taxview from the FBAAview a from outside of the LMGview from Ryker for someone setting up a business today*US Tarrif War doing funky things to the Sharemarket and people's SuperWill this affect RBA Rate Movements?Does this mean things like living expenses are going up?What is in someone's Super?Is this an opportunity to talk about SMSF Lending?*If cost of living is going up, will people cut their Insurance?Disclaimers in the videoFor the new brokers out there - do you include a professional relationship in your process?

So you made it into your 3rd year running your broker business, now what? You are, in theory, exiting the "Survival Mode" and now entering the "Growth Mode" of your business. Do you pivot? Do you get a mentor? Do you bring on more staff? What roles should the new staff members do? Does more staff equate to more revenue / profit? We ask Justin to impart on the experience that he had, the highs and the lows of someone running a business. Whilst Lending 4 U is based in Tasmania, we are sure that the experiences are pretty common for any brokerage.

Todays hosts are Sadish Visvalingam and stepping in for Beth CominoBeth Comino is the lovely Chelsea Deacon. As always we will chat about the happenings in the group and news in the wider industry that may be interesting to brokers. In the hotseat this week we have David Browne, Mortgage broker with 16+ years experience in finance. Prior o being a broker, David worked for Westpac for almost 20 years. Manager Legal & Compliance and establishing loan processing centres! David is also Co Founder and Director of Remote Broker Solutions. ------------------------------------------------------------------- News Topics this past week: (1) Fair Work Australia case where a business directly employing someone outside of Australia is still subject to FWA rules and regulations. Source: https://www.fwc.gov.au/.../decisionss.../pdf/2024fwc2669.pdf ------------------------------------------------------------------- (2) AMP announces commission changes last Friday (after the wrap had gone to air. Will others follow? Source:https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=3899141367037120&set=gm.2773700406170253&idorvanity=471487283058255 ------------------------------------------------------------------- (3) VIC State Government implements changes to reduce investment properties? New Victorian Short Stay Tax & Vacant residential land tax. Good or Bad?Source:https://www.sro.vic.gov.au/short-stay-levyhttps://www.sro.vic.gov.au/vacant-residential-land-tax-- ------------------------------------------------------------------- (4) Australian Gov takes steps to ban under 16 from Social media.What does this mean for you? Will F&C need a new home???? Source: https://www.abc.net.au/.../how-the-age-minimum.../104571790

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Wendy Brown, Head of Broker Sales at Macquarie Bank, at their new headquarters in Sydney. In this candid conversation, Wendy covers: A Look Back at 2024: Reflecting on the key trends and challenges of the broker industry over the past year. Macquarie’s Commitment to Brokers: How Macquarie continues to support brokers and their stance on the importance of the broker industry. The real reason for Macquarie’s change-up to credit reports: not all is as it seems! What’s Coming in 2025: Exciting investment in digital innovations to make the broker and customer experience even better. Grab a cuppa and listen to the full interview.

News and views relating to the F&C Community and the wider broker industry. This week, Beth Comino⁠ goes solo on a different style of the usual weekly wrap. In the news this week: it is a new month so rate movement will be a topic of discussion again. Whilst the RBA has yet to make any announcements, lenders have begun to drop their own rates. This week, Macquarie Bank dropped Fixed Rates to 5.39% p.a. for owner occupied P&I 2-year fixed term at ≤70% LVR. We ask our guests what they thought about this and if they think others will follow. In this episode, we are joined by Kerri Buurman from WA and Tracy Trang Le from VIC. Its not often we have an all women panel to discuss things finance and of course being a business owner. Each of these ladies run very successful brokerages. So we asked them advice on what they would give others about: *Being an Owner of a business *Growing a business *If they would do anything differently.

News and views relating to the F&C Community and the wider broker industry. Hosted by Sadish Visvalingam and Beth Comino This week we have Michael Russell (MD MoneyQuest Group) on as guest. TOPICS: (1) Right to disconnect A "right to disconnect" rule has come into effect in Australia, offering relief to people who feel forced to take calls or read messages from employers after they finish their day’s work. Discuss: How will this affect a broker’s business? Source article: click here (2) NAB Announces new Commission changes Effective from 1st September 2024, NAB has introduced a stepped clawback commission rate for new residential loans, easing the burden on brokers when clients refinance. Discuss: Is this really a win for brokers? Source article: click here (3) US Fed cut rates by 50bps. Will the RBA follow? A few things to consider.: We also see some lenders with sharp fixed rate drops (e.g Macquarie 5.59% 2 yr Fixed). However - the unemployment rate is still low (their target is 5%. Currently 4.2% in July) and inflation is still too high (currently tracking around 3.8% Year in Year). Discuss: will the RBA follow next month? Australia is the only Western Country not to drop rates. Source article: click here (3) US Fed as moved rates: what does this mean for RBA? And of course we ask Michael “what advice he would give to a broker who has just completed their send year in business”

News and Opinions on the happenings in the F&C Community and the wider industry. Hosted by ⁠Sadish Visvalingam⁠ and ⁠Beth Comino⁠ This week we have two guests Chris Slater from Zettle and Rachael Bland from Get Smart Financial Services. We ask them what they would advise someone who has a Brokerage that is 2 years old in today's market. Todays topics: *Diversification into non consumer lending - W/C, A/F etc etc and brokers need to look into it. Clients are stickier, and the banks know this. Are you on the diversification train yet? *ING to be 6th by end of 2024 - commentary that will be well received. A stark contrast to the majors negativity towards brokers. *Macquarie the BIG 5 -> Boringly consistent - Consistently Good! Macquarie grew its home loan business five times faster than its major bank rivals in July, And they dont compete on price!

This week, the lovely Victoria Coster stands in place of Beth as Co-host with Sadish to chat about the happenings in the F&C Community and some interesting topics in the wider industry that may affect Finance Brokers in Australia. Today's Topics: BoQ to cut jobs; Changes to broker reference checking and Did you know F&C has an awards night? Our Guest this week is: Rhianna Farnan from Derwent Finance. We ask her "What would she do today if she owned a broker business that is 2 years old? Side note: did you know that Rhianna has multiple Tik Tok videos which have smashed the 1.5m mark? So grab a cuppa and have a listen.

Each week, we drop a video inside the group where you get to learn something new about a product or service out there that may be of benefit for you or your clients. We make it fun by incorporating these sessions in a monthly quiz where you can win $1000 gift voucher from us? - All you got to do is take part in a monthly Quiz and get the highest score. Which means you can do it as many times as you like. This episode deals with outsourcing your back office. With the high court case in NSW regarding payroll tax in the headlines, it's probably a great idea to check whats out there. New kid on the block - REMOTE BROKER SOLUTIONS - chats with us in this episode. Whilst new, David Browne has been in the industry as a broker for many years. So to say he knows your pain points is not an exaggeration. So grab a cuppa and have a listen

Salestrekker is the name of a CRM platform that all smaller aggregators who don't have their own proprietary software use. A few brokers and large brokerages who are with larger aggregators also use Salestrekker in addition to their aggregator software. Why is this the case? Ease of use and intuitive UX could be key. But who is behind Salestrekker? and what is the story behind why it came to exist? In this episode, Dien talks to Dalibor Ivkovic about his journey from refugee to a Powerhouse in the 3rd Party Broker space in Australia. Dalibor Ivkovic came to Australia as a refugee during the 1990s as a result of the unrest due to the War in the former Yugoslavia. He, his mother and sister settling in Tasmania because he had an Uncle who lived there. Having to overcome his struggle with a new language, he graduated university as an engineer and ended up in the Brewing Industry for 12 years! His career with Carlton Breweries (in VIC) lead him to Brisbane. And it is here that he started an unsuccessful Web Development Business which luckily lead to him accidently falling into the finance broker industry. By pure chance, a mortgage broker friend, John Paynter needed a new website built. This lead to John (and his assistant) receiving more leads than they were able handle. So Dalibor looked at the mortgage broker process to see how he could save time for John (and other brokers) by looking at where the inefficiencies were. Not long after that Xsource (a Processing Business for Brokers) was born. Being the Engineer that he was, Dalibor developed systems and processes before he started to build a customer base. All business was via word of mouth and today Xsource employs 80 staff to assist brokers from all over Australia. A hurdle he found early on was to track a status of a deal in-flight, both for the processor and the broker. There was nothing on the market at the time - they went through a few off the shelf platforms before building their own Platform - Salestrekker. Initially Dalibor was going to leave it to his mom to run whilst he concentrated on the main business - loan processing. Then one day, whilst attending a Connective PD Day, a speaker on the topic of Future of open banking sparked the idea that Salestrekker had the ability (and now the opportunity) to become something big. Luck was again on his side because a commonly used CRM at the time, Symmetry, as sold and then on-sold to larger businesses that didnt take an interest in the small sample size of mortgage brokers in Australia. As a result not much effort as put in place to keep it relevant to the Aggregators who used it as their CRM. Enter Salestrekker and the rest is history. One of the things that made Salestrekker so successful was because Dalibor was always looking for what that next bottleneck for a brokers will be in the future. Programmes that saw early adoption and integration by Salestrekker were things that would massively cut down on time on a file. Applications such as " e-sig, video conferencing and recording, bankstatements.com.au etc integrated for brokers to use. The Pandemic brought most of this applications to the forefront, especially video conferencing. Another matter in 2021 that will be critical will be Best Interest Duty (BID). As of 1 January 2021, BID is in play where Broker are to Act in the best interest of their client. Otherwise they would find themselves on the wrong end of the court system. Dalibor strongly believes that Tech will play an important role in helping brokers be able to successfully navigate BID. Those who dont pick it (tech) up will struggle to operate without their CRM or other tech solutions to prove their conversations with their clients. Are your processes and systems ready? Is there more education that is needed? Are you BID Ready?

In this Podcast, Dien Le and James Angus (Bluestone Mortgages Chief Customer Officer) had a candid chat about the Federal Budget, the easing of Responsible Lending and how that may have an impact on broker business. Also discussed was an insightful look into the operations of how Bluestone worked with brokers in the current market, FY20 results, the impact of COVID-19, and Bluestone’s roadmap for the next 12 months and beyond. Some exciting products in development and one coming to the market next week like a 90% LVR with NIL RISK /LMI at 3.59% (3.60% comparison rate) being one of them.  Full doc, owner occupied purpose only.  Metro Melbourne and Sydney postcodes, Brisbane Metro to come at a later date.  So listen in and then get in touch with your Bluestone BDM today! **Interest Rates are correct as at 15/10/20 and subject to change at any time. The comparison rate is based on a loan amount of $150,000, over a 25 year term. WARNING: This comparison rate is true only for the example given and may not include all fees and charges. Different terms, fees or other loan amounts might result in a different comparison rate. Terms, conditions, fees and charges apply and your full financial situation would need to be reviewed prior to acceptance of any offer or product.