Michael J. Griffiths

1 month ago | moneyage.co.uk | Michael J. Griffiths

Mortgage advisers are failing over-50s on later life lending advice by not making them aware of all their options, Key Later Life Finance has warned. The firm believes mortgage advisers are missing out on a “huge opportunity” to grow their businesses and deliver better customer outcomes under Consumer Duty rules. Key cited Bank of England figures that showed that more than two out of five mortgages now run past retirement age, highlighting a need for a new approach from mortgage advisers.

1 month ago | moneyage.co.uk | Michael J. Griffiths

The average number of monthly mortgage completions has increased by 26% in the wake of the Autumn Budget since changes to stamp duty were first announced, data released by Barclays has shown. The bank said this has largely been driven by a 59% surge in first-time buyer purchases, whose share of completions has risen seven percentage points, from 29% to 36%.

1 month ago | moneyage.co.uk | Michael J. Griffiths

Metro Bank has launched a new partnership with Covecta, an AI platform for financial services that will be deployed across its corporate and commercial credit businesses. Covecta is a third-party Agentic AI solution that completes tasks across the end-to-end loan lifecycle, from lead acquisition to servicing. Metro Bank and Covecta found that each completed task allowed for a 60-80% reduction in time, creating significant improvements in team efficiency, decision making and risk analysis.

1 month ago | moneyage.co.uk | Michael J. Griffiths

The number of cash ISA products available on the market has risen to 598 deals, its highest ever level, according to new data published by Moneyfacts. Product choice across the savings market overall did fall slightly to 2,146 savings deals this month, although this is still the second highest count on Moneyfacts’ records, going back to February 2007.

1 month ago | moneyage.co.uk | Michael J. Griffiths

The commercial lending arm of Yorkshire Building Society, YBS Commercial Mortgages, grew its balance sheet to £2.2bn in 2024. The commercial lender completed £453m of commercial mortgage loans during the year, £377m of which went into servicing the private rental sector, and £76m into commercial real estate, which includes the lender’s commercial investment, semi-commercial and owner-occupied product offerings.