The next evolution of mortgage broking won’t be led by those who write the most loans, rather by those who build businesses that can outlive them, says Phil Rice from the Business Advice Agency.
For years, mortgage brokers have been told a simple story about exit and retirement: build a trail book, sell it, and you are done.
That narrative has been repeated so often that it’s become accepted wisdom. The problem is, it only tells half the truth – and for many brokers, it’s the wrong half.
After more than 30 years in this industry, I’ve seen how this really plays out. When brokers reach the point where they want to slow down, step back, or exit altogether, what they usually discover is not a saleable business, but a job that has finally caught up with them.
The trail book might have value, but the business wrapped around it often doesn’t, and that distinction matters more today than it ever has.
Most broker operations are still built around the broker. You generate the leads. You manage the referrers. You hold the client relationships in your head. You know where the files are, how the process works, and which balls can’t be dropped. From the inside, that feels like control. From the outside, it looks like risk, and any buyer worth their salt can see it immediately – if you step away, the wheels fall off.
This is where the industry’s obsession with trail books has quietly limited brokers’ thinking. A trail book is an income stream. A business is a system. One can be sold with minimal disruption – the other can be transferred, scaled, or inherited. Too many brokers only have the first.
What’s rarely discussed is how many brokerages are effectively “terminated” at exit. The trail book is sold off, staff scatter, systems disappear, and whatever brand equity existed dissolves overnight. That’s not succession. That’s liquidation with better marketing.
Smart business thinkers outside of broking have warned about this for decades. Build the business as if you intend to exit – even if you don’t.
Not because you’re planning to leave tomorrow, but because a business designed to run without you is stronger, more profitable, and more resilient today. When you remove yourself as the bottleneck, growth stops being painful and starts being deliberate.
Succession, when done properly, is not about selling and walking away. It’s about options. It allows you to step back gradually, bring in leadership, retain equity, protect clients, and maximise value on your own terms. But none of that is possible if the business only works when you’re in the chair.
Here’s the irony: the more successful many brokers become, the harder it is for them to exit well. Growth adds complexity, staff, compliance obligations, and admin. Without structure, success just deepens dependency on the founder. The broker becomes indispensable – and therefore unsellable.
What makes this issue urgent – not theoretical – is the demographic reality of the broker market right now. Finance Brokers Association of Australia (FBAA) polling shows around 30 per cent of active mortgage brokers are already aged 60 or over, with the average broker age sitting at 50 and three in five having more than a decade in the industry.
A meaningful cohort has been broking for 25 years or more. At the same time, older brokers report far greater uncertainty about retirement timing, with many expecting to work well into their 70s – not always by choice.
Against a backdrop where the median age at death in Australia sits around 80 for men and mid-80s for women, the uncomfortable truth is this: succession is not a “later” problem. It is a current, structural risk facing a large portion of the broker workforce, and one the industry has been poorly equipped to deal with.
This structural gap has been the missing piece in broking for a long time. Aggregator software, CRMs, and virtual assistants have helped, but they were never designed to turn brokerages into stand-alone, turnkey organisations. They help you operate. They don’t help you transfer ownership or leadership.
That’s why the recent launch of Emerald Edge matters. Not as shiny new tech, but as infrastructure. For the first time, brokers have access to a platform purpose-built to systemise the front end of their business – lead generation, client onboarding, document collection, staff monitoring, referral partner engagement – and tie it all together with automation and embedded business coaching.
The practical outcome is simple but profound. The business stops living in your head and starts living in systems. Clients interact with the brand, not just the broker. Referral partners have visibility and confidence.
Staff performance is measurable. Processes are repeatable. Someone else can step in and run the operation without everything grinding to a halt.
That is what turns a brokerage into a turnkey proposition.
When you combine that level of structure with a trail book, the conversation changes. Buyers aren’t just acquiring income – they’re acquiring a functioning enterprise.
Risk drops. Confidence rises. Valuations follow. In many cases, exit value doesn’t just improve – it multiplies.
This is not theory. Through my work with brokers via Better Business Coach, Business Advice Agency, and the Evolving Broker Academy with the FBAA, the same pattern shows up again and again. Brokers who invest early in structure make more money, work less reactively, and retain control over their future. Brokers who delay are forced into decisions later, usually under pressure.
The timing matters. The earlier a broker implements infrastructure like Emerald Edge, the greater the compounding effect. Better margins, lower stress, easier recruitment, stronger valuations, and critically, real succession options – whether that’s internal handover, partial sale, or full exit.
The uncomfortable truth is that succession planning is no longer optional. It’s not something to think about five years from retirement. It’s a responsibility – to clients, to staff, and to yourself. The industry is finally waking up to the idea that trail books alone are not a strategy.
The next evolution of mortgage broking won’t be led by those who write the most loans, rather it will be led by those who build businesses that can outlive them. Emerald Edge has arrived at exactly the right moment to make that possible.
Phil Rice is the CEO of the Business Advice Agency (BAA).
He has more than 27 years of finance experience and has been advocating a “fairer deal” for brokers when it comes to clawback, including by raising the issue with AFCA, ASIC, the small business ombudsman’s office in Queensland, and the broker associations.
