https://ift.tt/LKqbTrD
Source: LiveMore Capital
LiveMore Capital, the specialist mortgage lender for over-50s, has agreed a £275m senior funding line with NatWest Markets.
The financing will facilitate LiveMore’s portfolio growth and loan originations for its interest-only mortgage products.
The funding line supports the next step in LiveMore’s journey to reimagine later-life mortgages and mobilise the wider financial services industry towards fairer, more holistic over-50s lending practices. This facility supports LiveMore’s product offering of their Retirement Interest Only mortgage, and its recently announced Term End Interest Only mortgage, which provides the opportunity for a longer fixed term rate, allowing borrowers to stay in their homes for longer.
LiveMore was established to support an underserved sector of the market, providing a wider range of options to cater to over-50s borrowers, who are often forgotten about by high street banks. Its product offerings, which lend at up to 75% LTV, provide a much-needed alternative solution to Equity Release, an option not suitable for every borrower.
The need for a new type of lender that recognises the diversity of later-life is borne out by LiveMore’s customer data. Its borrowers have an average age of 68 while the eldest is 92, with 35% of those over 65 still working well past the state retirement age. Joint and single borrowers are split evenly, with single female borrowers constituting more than a third (37%).
The funding comes against a backdrop of growing regulatory pressure, as authorities such as the PRA continue to encourage providers to broaden choice for over 50s. The FCA has highlighted the shortfalls of mortgage products for the over-50s market, which is contributing to pensioners becoming trapped in high interest rate mortgages, and therefore unable to meet affordability criteria for remortgaging. Its November 2021 study revealed there are 47,000 mortgage prisoners in the UK, and with inflation rates now at a 30-year high, more over-50s could fall into this category.
Jennifer Wallaert, Managing Director, Head of Specialty Finance, NatWest Markets, said:
“NatWest is pleased to support LiveMore in the next stage of its growth with the launch of their term end interest only mortgage product. This transaction demonstrates NatWest’s expertise and capabilities in arranging a tailored secured senior funding warehouse as well as a hedging solution to a specialist lender offering a longer-term fixed rate mortgage product to support later life borrowers in the UK.”
George Ross, Managing Director, Head of Specialty Finance, C&I, NatWest, added:
“Assisting UK specialty finance businesses, especially one providing a focused solution to an underserved sector of the UK mortgage market, lies at the very heart of NatWest’s purpose led strategy to support UK businesses and consumers. LiveMore’s product offering will be instrumental in helping later life borrowers remain in their properties for longer and NatWest is delighted to be supporting LiveMore on this exciting journey.”
Leon Diamond, CEO of LiveMore added:
“We are thrilled to be working with NatWest Markets to support our growth, so we can continue to serve the often forgotten over 50s market. Having the support from NatWest Markets means together we can help mobilise the industry around our mission to help the over 50s have genuine control of their financial lives. We have listened to the regulators and our customers, and with the support of this relationship, we can continue to provide options for later life borrowers underserved by high street lenders.”
Financial Services
