Ravi Chandran
Mortgage broker market dominated by internet-savvy millennials says once Australian research
A research from Australia suggests that millennials dominate mortgage broker market. Roy Morgan, Australia’s best known and longest established market research company, shows that in the 12 months to March 2018 nearly half (48.6%) of the existing home borrowers who used a mortgage broker over the last five years to obtain their current loan were Millennials. This was well above the share of any other generation.
These are the findings from Roy Morgan’s Single Source survey of over 50,000 consumers per annum, including over 5,000 home loan customers with a loan held for five years or under.
Mortgage broker market dominated by Millennials and Generation X
The following chart shows that with the dominance of Millennials (48.6% broker share), combined with Generation X (38.8%), that together they account for 87.4% of current home borrowers using mortgage brokers where their loan had been held for five years or less. Baby Boomers account for only 9.0% of this market, followed by Generation Z (3.1%) and Pre-Boomers (0.5%).
Composition of Mortgage Broker Market Dominated by Generations
Mortgage broker market dominated by Millennials because they are most likely to use their services
This chart shows that 42.5% of millennials with a current home loan of five years or less used a mortgage broker. In second place was Generation X (37.0%), followed by Baby Boomers (27.6%) and Pre-Boomers (21.2%).
Home Loan Borrowers Using Mortgage Broker market dominated by Generations
Norman Morris, Industry Communications Director, Roy Morgan said: “The dominance of millennials in the use of mortgage brokers to obtain their home loan is most likely due to a number of factors. These include the fact that this generation has grown up at a time when mortgage brokers were always there and so that they are seen as a very familiar way of acquiring a home loan.”
“This is in contrast to the older generations that they may be less likely to use them and so be more used to going directly to a bank. Another potential reason is that with rapidly rising house prices, combined with the fact that more millennials are likely to be first home buyers, then mortgage brokers may be seen as possibly being a way of borrowing more as they have the potential to get a better interest rate.”
He added: “The data regarding mortgage brokers that has been used here is only a fraction of what we have collected on all aspects the home loan market over many years. The full database enables a detailed understanding of home loan holders currently, as well as trends. They can also be understood in context with all other financial products such as managed funds, superannuation, accounts, credit cards, insurance, direct investments. “This more holistic understanding of the home loan market is important as home loans do not operate in a ‘silo’ but are part of each households overall financial position.”
Commenting on the research by Roy Morgan, chief mortgage consultant at icompareloan.com said that in the context of Singapore, most wealthy people want to use mortgage brokers as they see the value in engaging them.
The chief mortgage consultant Paul Ho added: “Younger people are receptive to mortgage brokers and they are also used to price comparison sites like icompareloan.com. Older people tend to think that you are not the bank and so are more apprehensive.”
Mr Ho said that older people tend to place a lot more respect on bankers despite the fact that banks have lowered their criteria for hiring bankers.
“Furthermore, a banker cannot tell you that his bank is not giving you the best packages as his/her role is to sell the bank’s packages,” Mr Ho added.
Mr Ho said that from the data he gathered from icompareloan.com, the leading mortgage comparison website in Singapore, “baby boomers who are IT savvy or who are able to surf the network effortlessly are most likely to overcome the mental block of using mortgage brokers to search for best home loans in Singapore.”
Not all home loans in Singapore are created equal – as some will try to charge more than others. This is why it is very important to find the right lender who meets your needs for more funds. Many factors come into play when you are searching for home loans in Singapore – factors like, if have you defaulted on home loans in Singapore or other loans in the past and how you service your existing loans.
With a good number of local and foreign financial institutions operating here in Singapore, the choice of a lender and its packages can be mind boggling. Imagine having to compare over hundreds of different loan packages and wondering which is best for you. Even if you are a specialist in finance, differences between the loans in Singapore are not so straight forward, because there are quite a few variables.
This is where an independent mortgage broker maybe useful for home hunters in their search for a loan which is the right fit for their needs. Without any partiality, the independent mortgage broker can compare a range of products and lenders. This will help home hunters save time and money, avoid confusion, and improve their chances of getting approved as well.
