Aggregator launches white label loan suite

The products include:

• CHL’s initial white label offering, funded by Advantedge, CHL Essentials (a no-frills, set and forget mortgage product)
• Adelaide Bank-funded CHL Select (a premium home loan with broad features, including offset)
• Pepper Money-funded prime, near-prime and specialist offering CHL Solutions
• white label commercial property and SMSF offering Resolve, which is funded by Thinktank

While CHL Essentials has been available for the past few years, the Solutions white label was launched in April 2019, followed by Select in May, while Resolve launched last month.

Speaking to The Adviser at the Connective Home Loans portfolio launch in Sydney on Tuesday (16 July), the head of Connective Home Loans, Michael Goerner, noted that brokers have been increasingly sending loans to white label providers.

Indeed, according to the MFAA’s most recent Industry Intelligence Service report, just under 8 per cent of all mortgages being written by brokers were white label products. Over the last six quarter-periods, from April-to-June 2017 to July-to-September 2018, the market share of broker-originated business to white label lenders has remained fairly stable, ranging from 7.2 per cent to 7.7 per cent market share. As of the quarter ending September 2018, market share was at 7.3 per cent.

Mr Goerner commented: “I think that with this whole lot of consumer confidence, consumers are not just after one solution. They want choice. And we want to make sure that our brokers at Connective can actually create a point of difference to brokers at other aggregators as well, in that they can offer more solutions through a white label portfolio rather than just having a single funder.”

The head of Connective Home Loans added that having a white label loan under the Connective brand also brought brokers “closer” to their clients and removes the risk of channel conflict or cross-selling.

He explained: “With white label loans, quite often there, is no channel conflict. The customer is closer to the broker, tends to stay longer, be more loyal and tells more people about their broker. 

“For example, if you ask a consumer who their loan is with, and they say Commonwealth Bank, they just talk about the loan. But if they don’t know the brand – the question is changed to ‘How did you get it?’ and the conversation becomes about the broker (as you can only get these products through the broker). So, it drives referral business back and makes the consumer think more about the broker when they think about their home loan – rather than thinking about a retail branch.”

Mr Goerner concluded: “Broking is evolving; the industry is asking for more of brokers; consumers are asking for more, and consumers are expecting something that is not available out in the retail space. So, the white label gives them the opportunity to offer that product and create a point of difference for their consumers. 

“This portfolio involves great quality products, at a great rate for the customer, provided by good funders in the background,” he said.

To service the new white label portfolio, Connective has hired five Connective Home Loans BDMs to service broker enquiries for the product suite.

Former Pepper BDMs Roselle Payuran and Michele Della Vedova are now Connective Home Loans BDMs for NSW(North)/CBD and WA (respectively), while former Connective broker support managers George Georges and Aaron Hase have become CHL BDMS for NSW(South)/ACT and QLD/NT (respectively). Tony Whelan is taking on responsibility for Connective Home Loans brokers in Victoria, Tasmania and SA.

[Related: Connective partners with Thinktank to launch new loan suite]