Changes in the Lifetime Mortgage Market
- 31 mins 26 secs
Learning: Structured
Tutors:
- Ashley Sampson, Southeast Business Development Manager, Pure Retirement
- Sara Robinson, Director of Adviser Services, Equity Release Associates
Learning outcomes:
- The outlook for lifetime mortgages in light of higher rates and a tougher economic backdrop
- The impact of inflation on clients’ needs
- What advisers should consider when recommending lifetime mortgages to clients
PRESENTER: Hello and welcome to this Akademia learning unit on changes in the lifetime mortgage market. I’m Mark Colegate and to discuss the topic I am joined here in the studio by Ashley Sampson, he is South East Business Development Manager at Pure Retirement, and we’re also joined by Sara Robinson, Director of Adviser Services at Equity Release Associates. Before I bring them in, let’s have a look at today’s structured learning outcomes. They are: the outlook for lifetime mortgages in light of higher rates and a tougher economic backdrop; the impact of inflation on clients’ needs; and what advisers should consider when recommending lifetime mortgages to clients.
A pretty tough economic backdrop at the moment, Ashley, how is the equity release market performing against that?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Good question really. I think it’s, we’re very, at the moment, looking at a good strength really. I think all in all we’ve weathered quite a lot of change, not only through COVID, through Brexit, but we’re definitely moving into an era of stability, and it’s a really good place to be right now.
PRESENTER: OK, thank you. Sara, what are your thoughts as you’re out and about talking with clients?
SARA ROBINSON: The equity release market’s been around for the last 50-odd years, so it’s certainly seen its ups and downs and it’s very, very resilient. So, yes, the last few years have been tough, certainly Brexit and COVID hit hard, but we’re seeing more and more demand for this type of product, and it’s becoming more mainstream than it ever has before.
PRESENTER: And is that because property prices are going up or because incomes are going down?
SARA ROBINSON: A little bit of both, a little bit of both. You know, I think of my own parents, they didn’t spend more than £4,000 on a property and when they passed away that sold for nearly £200,000. And that’s the same right across the board, rising property prices, everything’s getting more expensive, but unfortunately pensions aren’t keeping pace with the cost of living so they have to look to their equity in their property.
PRESENTER: Ashley, you mentioned COVID, are there any knock-on effects from that period, 2020/2021, which are now, you’re seeing coming through the market today?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course, and I think the major one we’re seeing right now is interest-only maturities from the extension that they may have had, and we’re definitely seeing a greater number of clients come to us looking for a funding for that reason. But it’s not only just the COVID changes or anything really, what we’re seeing is more people who have potentially not saved enough for retirement or maybe are helping that family member maybe come over that COVID period. So we’re definitely seeing a need, not coming just from COVID, but we’re seeing more clients from that area.
PRESENTER: And, Sara, I suppose that does raise the question of, if you can release equity from your house, that’s great, but as an adviser you must be saying well there’s some cases that it makes sense to do that and there’s others where I think that might be a slightly frivolous use of a mortgage?
SARA ROBINSON: When advisers sit down with clients, any decent adviser isn’t immediately going to go straight to equity release. There’s all sorts of alternatives they should be looking at: downsizing, do they have savings, have they taken their tax free amount from pensions. They should be looking at all those alternatives before they actually get to well you’ve discounted all those, equity release does look like it’s the right route for you. In terms of whether it’s frivolous or not, you can advise a client. But in terms of your own belief, whether you think it’s frivolous or not, that’s down to you. Over the last 14 years of being in this industry, I’ve spoken to clients who’ve released funds to buy shares in a racehorse. Now, this was a gentleman that he was single, never been married, had no family, loved race-horsing and that was, you know, he spent his twilight years following these racehorses he’d sort of semi-adopted round the country. But certainly in the last few years, you know, during Brexit and COVID, we’ve seen more of an increase in gifting. And it’s intergenerational gifting. It’s maybe not even the next generation down, but it may be the grandchildren. You know, a huge increase in university fees, getting the younger members of the family on the property ladder, that’s where we’ve seen a big increase.
PRESENTER: And, Ashley, is there also an element to this that if people are gifting money, they’d actually like to see it being spent and enjoyed rather than thinking I’ll never get to see any of this?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Well, hundred percent, and I think also with what we’ve had through COVID, people want to see their children, that the bank of mum and dad or the bank of grandma and grandad want to see them enjoy it whilst they’re alive. But also the perception maybe of rather than receiving bricks and mortar, which it traditionally always has been, maybe passing the wealth down early has seen to be very, very much popular and definitely on an increase from what we’ve seen probably for the last year or two now. Which is a really exciting point, because it opens up equity release to a whole new division, not just to those typical products where it is needs-based, it’s massively moving into that aspirational need as well, and that obviously fills the boat of saying well, you know, my son, my daughter, we need to get them on the property ladder, let’s maybe give them a bit of wealth now and see them enjoy it in the twilight years.
PRESENTER: We’ve talked a little bit about the economic backdrop and some of those other broader issues around advice and how people want to spend their money, but in terms of the market itself, Ashley, equity release, lifetime mortgages, there’s periods where they’re more in favour, less in favour, where are we at the moment, what’s going on to really underpin it?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: I think it’s two-prong really, and as I mentioned earlier aspirational needs or needs-based driven advice is two different avenues. I think really what’s driving it now is more the awareness of equity release. So, especially looking after the region that I do, I think that more holistic financial planners are getting into this market. So rather than it just being traditionally a broker market, we’re now showing that holistic financial adviser that advises from the start to the finish what this product can do. So where we have always been OK well traditionally debt consolidation, home improvements is always a very much large factor of release, we’re now looking at it more of a different way, where clients may say OK well we may look at taxation planning or we may have a different avenue. So more and more people are entering the product than there ever has been, and it’s opening the doors to more clients than we have ever seen.
SARA ROBINSON: It’s becoming more part and parcel of people’s retirement planning, because it’s become more mainstream.
PRESENTER: But are you seeing, Sara, more people with more qualifications, so if someone’s watching this and they’re thinking well this is a really interesting area but I wouldn’t feel confident just leaping in with both feet now, what’s out there to help you as an adviser that perhaps wasn’t there five, 10, 15 years ago?
SARA ROBINSON: I think there’s certainly more in terms of what the brokers in the market, the lenders, like Ashley, are doing to help those advisers who are newer to the market in terms of more structured learning. There’s a lot of support out there. Organisations like the one that I’m associated with, we’ve certainly brought on advisers who are very immature to the market as well as very experienced advisers. And sometimes your inexperienced adviser, they’re more sponge-like in terms of soaking up all that knowledge than maybe a more mature adviser who’s perhaps a little bit set in their ways. As the market has changed and the products have changed, you do have to move with the times as an adviser. And it’s certainly a role where you’re always learning, you’re never static and absolutely know everything that’s going on.
PRESENTER: But given what you’ve said there, it sounds like there’s a bit more complexity in the market, there’s more choice, how do you keep on top of that, is that getting a bit overwhelming?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, absolutely. The lenders don’t make it easy for advisers to keep up to speed. You’ve got interest rates that are either going one way or the other. Certainly there’s a lot of innovation over the years that I’ve been in the industry, so things have changed. So they’ve certainly become more client-focused plans than they ever were before. They were quite structured, quite rigid; they’ve become far more flexible over the years. Which has made it better for clients, but of course advisers are always having, they’re always being kept on their toes, let’s put it that way.
PRESENTER: Well, picking up on that, Ashley, one of the big themes at the moment, and it’s ongoing, is the dreaded Consumer Duty.
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Yes.
PRESENTER: And what Sara’s suggesting is real ability to bespoke outcomes for clients. So can you talk us through a little bit of that, what are some of the things that you’re thinking of as a provider when it comes to Consumer Duty and how that can help advisers and their clients?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course. So obviously with Consumer Duty, which is going to be implemented on the 31st of July 2023, it’s been in conversation now for almost a year. What we want in this market is a good client outcome, but what Consumer Duty does is adds an extra layer of support for the end consumer. So rather than just talking about a good client outcome, what we need to facilitate, and this is not just from a provider but also an adviser, is that a client from start to finish needs to be recorded and labelled correctly. So even if they don’t purchase a product, they need to make sure that they go for the right avenue, everything is done to the best interest of the client. And really what we’re doing is protecting this market. We want this market to continue because it’s a great solution for the end consumer. But with this extra support, from the extra support that we’ve had from the Equity Release Council and now adding the FCA Consumer Duty on, it’s just providing that client with that extra security.
PRESENTER: OK. Now, Sara, you mentioned interest rates are always moving around, and certainly after a long period where they’ve been very, very low, rates have been going up, so how has that altered the dynamics of the market and the appeal of equity release?
SARA ROBINSON: I think over the years that I’ve been in the industry, clients have become a lot more savvy and they have become a lot more rate driven. So of late we have certainly seen clients approaching us and then saying oh maybe the time isn’t right. That’s nothing new. It’s always been very much when the time is right for the clients, not for us or certainly not for the lender. As a wise old colleague of mine has always told me, the one with the highest interest rate isn’t always the worst and the one, with the lowest interest rate isn’t always the best, it’s what that interest rate can do for you. So, those clients, who Ashley’s already mentioned and referred to, who maybe have interest-only mortgages that are maturing and certainly no repayment vehicle to clear that off and are now under pressure post-COVID from the bank or the building society to pay it off, you know, getting rid of that mortgage, maybe being able to retire, clearing it via equity release, yes, they may be paying a slightly higher interest rate than if they’d have done this 12 months ago, however, I come back to the flexibility of the plans in the future, if the interest rates come down, with this market you’re not stuck with that plan.
We talk about lifetime mortgages and it gives the impression that the client is stuck with that for their lifetime, but like a traditional mortgage, you can always look at re-broking if the interest rates come down. I know as a lender that’s probably not something Ashley likes me to talk about, but that’s the reality of the market, rebroking it when interest rates come down, very, very attractive for a client. And we certainly do an annual review with our clients to see whether we can help them, whether they’ve still got the right plan for them.
PRESENTER: Ashley, what are your thoughts on that and again if rates are going higher, does that make it less attractive for you to lend as much, more attractive?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Well, I guess, if we look at historical rates, and that’s what we need to do rather than just look at a period where we’ve been in ultra-low gilt percentages, but if we take a historical view, we’re averaging out where the market’s traditionally always been. Now, don’t get me wrong, when we see higher interest rates, especially from a provider, people question or they decide well is it ready to defer, as you mentioned, and then we talk about maybe the cost to defer. So from a provider sense, for us, we’re pretty much all very much competitive. It relates to the LTV, so the loan to value size that the client may be able to take. The higher LTV obviously gets, the higher the APR. But, as a provider, I think we’re very much understanding of where the gilts are right now and we have to price effectively. But I do believe that where we are right now is a good point and the gilts, if they may drop or they may go up, we will have to price effectively.
PRESENTER: And how much time do you spend thinking about, when you’re underwriting this, there’s obviously the repayment terms, there’s also the capital value of the property itself, so do you have to take a view on where you see house prices going?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course. I guess for us though what we have to take into account is that this is a lifetime contract. So typically if we look at maybe what Lloyds have published or we look at a downgrade to the property index, that’s only short-term. So when we take into account our back book and how much properties we look at, it’s quite a lengthy period. So yes obviously when we have to value the property, say from today, we look at what the value is today. And the valuers that we send out to clients’ properties may take that into effect. But I guess it’s crystal ball gazing isn’t it, we can’t assume what the properties will be worth in two, three, four years’ time. On our KFIs, we stipulate an increase and a decrease, but when we talk about looking at it from today, the valuers would go out to the property and value it on today’s rates.
PRESENTER: Sara, get your thoughts on that, do you ever get people worried that, either think they’ve got a fantastic deal because they’ve borrowed more money and then their house price will go down, or worrying that at that point they’ve borrowed a lot more against the value of that property than they felt comfortable with?
SARA ROBINSON: More often than not, when you’re meeting certainly a couple, joint clients, you will tend to find that one is very gung-ho about equity release and then you find that one member of the party is a little bit more sceptical and they’re usually quite concerned about potentially what will be left as an inheritance for the children. What you tend to find is that when you sit down with them and you’re putting your fact find together and you’re making your recommendation and you’re trying to get a rough idea of what the property may currently be worth before submitting it to the lender, they’ll always say ah well the one that went for down the road, you know, they haven’t got as big a back garden as us or we’ve got a nicer bathroom suite and that sort of thing, and it’s trying to educate a client that actually the valuation is based on the square footage and where it is in conjunction to maybe commercial property, etc.
So, yes, there is always that little bit of an inkling, certainly with a couple, at the back of their mind, well what could be left, and you usually find that one member of the party is perhaps reining in the other member if they’ve got quite ambitious plans and well no let’s not take that much, and quite often you may find, after doing your initial fact find and going back to making your recommendation, they’ve perhaps reassessed the figures they’re looking to borrow. They’ve had a further think about it and maybe perhaps reined in some of their grand plans.
PRESENTER: Well, coming back to that on Consumer Duty, obviously consumer outcome is incredibly important, but if you’re dealing with a couple, as you’ve said, that’s two people, so any tips there on how you make sure that there’s genuinely a consensus rather than one person steamrolling the other?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, because you can end up sometimes feeling a bit like a marriage guidance counsellor when you’re sitting in between the two. That’s not an uncommon situation to find yourself in. Give them time. You know, you have to sit there, give them all the information, give them the time to consider it. You can’t steamroller it, you can’t apply any pressure, you’ve got to go at their pace. Ideally we like to do face-to-face appointments so we can sit in front of them and sit there. They’re in the comfort of their own home, they feel comfortable, rather than trying to do it on a phone where you’re trying to do it over a speakerphone and that doesn’t always work, so certainly face-to-face is an ideal situation to be in.
PRESENTER: And, Ashley, we’ve talked a little bit about some of the trends in the market, but one thing we haven’t touched on is typically the size of loan that people are taking out. Are you seeing any changes in that?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: We are. Right now we are anyway. So, if we take a trend from our book anyway, typically in the market, if we take it as a whole rather than geographical area, we’re probably looking at around about a loan to size value around about 124,000. Now geographically that does change, but what we’re seeing right now is around a 70,000 take, so initial is around 70,000 to 72,000. There are many factors for that. The majority of what we’re seeing right now is that I think with the way the world is people are just taking their bare needs. So rather than, I’ve looked at earlier, aspirational lending, they’re saying OK well needs right now are I’ve got to pay an interest-only mortgage, let’s just take that now. But also what we’re seeing is people move from products.
So what we’re seeing is traditionally a lump sum product is probably our widely taken product where drawdown comes second, in our business anyway, but recently we’re now seeing people take more of a drawdown solution. So what they’re saying is OK well we’ll take this right now, but we’ll have a larger drawdown reserve. Because with us, at Pure, when you take a drawdown it’s done at prevailing rates. So what they’re saying is well we’ll do bare bones, we’ll pay an interest-only mortgage that we need, but we’ll have a bit in the background or we’ll look at maybe bolstering our retirement lifestyle with, say, 100,000 in a drawdown reserve. So we’re definitely seeing perception shift right now.
PRESENTER: OK and, Sara, are you seeing similar trends?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, initially we get a lot of clients that have been approaching us over the last six or seven months wanting to borrow the maximum that they can. And of course you have to start reining them in because that has an impact on the interest rate they’re going to be offered. So I would very much concur with what Ashley says that clients are taking the minimum but having that back-up plan of a drawdown in place. And that’s mostly driven by the cost of living, you know, increasing gas and fuel prices, food prices, they’re on fixed incomes perhaps with state pensions, maybe small company pensions, they need to eke out that money that’s sitting there for the future. If they need it, they need it, if they don’t, well great, there’s going to be more left in the property for the family to inherit at the end of the day.
PRESENTER: And just coming back to COVID and trends there, Ashley, any sign that, there was mania for home improvements when everyone was in lockdown.
ASHLEY SAMPSON: There was.
PRESENTER: Has that run its course now and what about the need for holidays, just to get out?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course. No, so I think what we’re seeing, home improvements will always be one of the largest reasons, but we’ve seen recently an actual downward trend to that. So we’re seeing more people take a lifestyle look really. So when everyone came out of COVID, they’d been in their house for a year and a half, they wanted to improve it. We’re now seeing that shift now. So we are seeing other things take over. So holidays are definitely one thing, lifestyle planning is another large proportion. But we’re also seeing other factors on the large increase too, so purchasing a property using equity release, taxation advice really on the large and gifting too. So home improvements has always been a core root of what we do, but recent trend shows that it is on the reduction right now.
PRESENTER: Just moving - oh sorry, Sara.
SARA ROBINSON: Certainly, yes, bucket list. It’s all the things on the bucket list-
ASHLEY SAMPSON: It is a bucket list, yes.
SARA ROBINSON: -that they’ve been wanting to do for the last few years and because they’ve been stuck in their homes because of COVID, now it’s time, we’re going to do that bucket list holiday or we’re going to go and get that motorhome and we’ve retired now, we can go and have a couple of weeks in Europe somewhere or even a couple of months in the motorhome and that sort of thing, so yes definitely away from the home improvements.
PRESENTER: Sara, I want to come back, because you were talking earlier about the importance of particularly couples working out between them what they’re comfortable about, but there’s obviously other people in the family, particularly if there’s gifting involved, so I want to get your thoughts on, if you’re an adviser, how many people should you be getting involved in this conversation?
SARA ROBINSON: Potentially and ideally, you want to get as many people involved as possible. Now that can make it a little bit unwieldy for an adviser to deal with, but certainly mum and dad get the children involved because they are probably going to be the major beneficiaries, at the end of the day, so they’re going to be the ones that are going to be potentially impacted by what’s left or what isn’t left in the property at the end of the day. And certainly what we’ve all had to adjust to over the last few years of being in COVID is working with technology to make that happen. So an adviser may be sitting with mum and dad, I live in the North West of England, so an adviser may be sitting up in the North West of England with mum and dad, but the children may be down here. So it’s using video technology, whether it’s Teams, Zoom or whatever app, FaceTime, Skype, whatever, to involve the children. And that’s becoming more and more prevalent these days. Whereas certainly earlier on in my time in this industry, it was sort of oh well my mum and dad didn’t leave me anything, the kids will get whatever’s left at the end of the day, and now they’re very much more driven to involve the family and try where they can to make sure that they’re doing this in a way where the children are comfortable.
PRESENTER: Ashley, is there any evidence, if you don’t have those conversations, that you might not see problems at the start but problems can emerge down the line in families?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course, and I know there’s a stat out there that seven out of 10 FOS complaints come from the beneficiaries of the estate. And I guess, for us, as Sara alluded to, is trying to involve as many people in that conversation as possible. We want a good client outcome and that’s provided by the product. But again it comes back to Consumer Duty and also offering a good client outcome is trying to involve as many people in that conversation as possible. And we, as a lender, really try and drive a good client outcome. And that’s one that’s going to come from it is making sure that the family are well astute to what’s happening, because this is obviously a large proportion of their potential inheritance that may be whittled down. So any protection that any adviser could give is just beneficial for us as a provider.
PRESENTER: Well I think you’ve both stressed that it’s a very complex area once you get families involved and more than one person involved so there’s that element to deal with it, a lot going on in the market as well. So, Ashley, any tips for advisers on what they can use as a framework or some sort of checklist that just make sure you haven’t forgotten anything, however minor it seems at the time, that could come back and bite you a bit down the line?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course. So, we as a provider don’t actually provide one, but what I’d always educate and promote someone to do is to have a look at the Equity Release Council website. The Equity Release Council is a magnificent resource for all advisers and I hope, Sara, you would agree as well-
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, I would.
ASHLEY SAMPSON: -is they are massively about Consumer Duty and providing advisers with the framework to really help them advise clients, so not only is there checklists, there’s a huge amount of support on there as well. So anything along that framework or to help an adviser really speak to a client or make sure that every tick box has been exercised. Every other provider or, sorry, every other advisory firm probably has their own internal one and over years they’ve mastered it and I’m sure yourself has one, trying to really get the best out of every client situation. It’s going to adapt, it’s going to change over years, and we try and work within the same framework, but anything additional is only a benefit really to everyone.
PRESENTER: OK, Equity Release Council. Sara?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, Ashley’s too modest to say it himself, but the lenders as well have an awful lot of information on their portals and their websites. They all tend to have adviser support areas where there again a huge source of information, learning, not just Pure, but right across the lenders in the market.
PRESENTER: Now, we’ve got a couple of minutes left. I want to move on to what’s available in products, obviously quite a lot of innovation going on, but, Sara, what are some of the things that you’re seeing that really make you think yeah this is definitely adding value rather than white noise to the market?
SARA ROBINSON: Yeah, some of the newer ones, and certainly the Equity Release Council championed this, was the flexibility to be able to make ad hoc repayments. So unlike a traditional mortgage that we’ve probably all either got or had in the past, you’ve got to make those regular monthly repayments, with equity release you’re not under any obligation to do that. However now the plans do offer that flexibility, so again getting the family involved and the children listening and mum and dad paying off that interest-only mortgage have suddenly freed up some disposable income, they can help to chip away at that rising increase of the interest on the lifetime mortgage. So that’s a great one, plus the three year exemption.
So, a couple again, sorry to keep coming back to couples but it does tend to be that way, usually find that when one of the spouses passes away, that’s when the one that’s left behind tends to think well this house is too big, it’s full of memories, perhaps I want to go and move, live near one of the children. Three year exemption: if you decide to sell up and move and repay the lifetime mortgage within three years of death of a spouse, you’re not going to get hit with any early repayment charges. So again very much client-focused, the client doesn’t have to, no knee-jerk reaction, they’ve got time to think about is this the right time to sell up and move, and decide what they want to do.
PRESENTER: But on that, if you’ve got an older contract that doesn’t have that on, are you going back to clients saying you should rebroke this, or are there times where actually some of the details and the deals available in older contracts, just because it’s old doesn’t mean it’s a bad contract?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, absolutely, absolutely. I can see Ashley smiling at me, because rebroking from one lender to another, when I’ve got a lender sat next to me, is a bit of a contentious issue; however, yes, there will be some that do have that flexibility, some that don’t, but you do have to look at the bigger picture because there are fees and charges involved in moving from one lender to another. You’ve got to take all that into consideration and weigh up the pros and cons and, again, get everybody involved, all parties, children, clients, the lot.
PRESENTER: Ashley, a couple of examples of innovation there, what else do you see that’s coming through at the moment that you think is a value-add?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: I think the main one is where the market’s moved for property criteria. So if you take a couple of years back and we have a look at what the criteria really looked like, it would be your average three bed semi-detached in Surrey would be perfect for a lender. But what we’ve really worked hard at is to really try and broaden the horizon. So, just to give you some examples where some properties may have been disregarded many years ago, products now can encompass maybe 100% flat roof or large acreages, so previously we may have looked at maybe 25/30% flat roof, products now and a lot of them on the market can look up to 100% flat roof. So what the market has really done and strived to do is not just to give the property to probably a really good resaleable property in the future, but really try and open and broaden the horizon to try and encompass as many properties as physically possible. Now, there are a couple of instances where that’s not applicable, near to commercial is a big one in the market, but we’ve really worked hard, not only with some people that internally fund but also external funders, to really try and grow this market, not just offering features and functions of the product, but trying to allow more people to access this.
If we talk about product functionality, from the 28th of March 2022, the Equity Release Council brought in a new standard that every product going forwards must have the overpayment facility. And typically in the market they range from 8 to 12% per year, we have a product which allows 20 or 40% overpayments. So it’s really broadened the horizon and given clients that functionality to say if you have the ability to, you can overpay, rather than saying OK you don’t have the obligation to but if you would like that option to maybe look at the compound effect or pay a little bit more, you have that option now. So we really have strived and I think the market should be hugely proud of where we’ve come from.
PRESENTER: Well, we are almost out of time, so I just want to get a final thought from each of you, covered a huge amount of ground, just one key message to leave us with, what would that be, Sara?
SARA ROBINSON: If you’re an adviser and you’re looking at this market and thinking about joining the market, certainly do your research, you’d be warmly welcomed and it’s very much a growing market and an exciting one to be involved in.
PRESENTER: Ashley?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: I think from where we stand, it’s a really positive market to be in. We are throwing education at as many advisers as physically possible to give them the tools, the utility to really try and implement themselves in the market. It’s a great place to be. It really works in holistic financial planning, especially when we’re talking about the later life decumulation phase. So for any adviser that’s not currently in the market, really, really like to see you take the exam, get your permissions, and once you do them the support is ongoing. We have a great marketing toolkit to help anyone proactively market and any questions are always welcome.
PRESENTER: We have to leave it there. Ashley Sampson, Sara Robinson, thank you both very much for joining us.
SARA ROBINSON: Thank you.
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Thank you.
PRESENTER: And do stay with us, we’ve got some information coming up in just a second on how you can use this as part of your structured CPD.
A pretty tough economic backdrop at the moment, Ashley, how is the equity release market performing against that?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Good question really. I think it’s, we’re very, at the moment, looking at a good strength really. I think all in all we’ve weathered quite a lot of change, not only through COVID, through Brexit, but we’re definitely moving into an era of stability, and it’s a really good place to be right now.
PRESENTER: OK, thank you. Sara, what are your thoughts as you’re out and about talking with clients?
SARA ROBINSON: The equity release market’s been around for the last 50-odd years, so it’s certainly seen its ups and downs and it’s very, very resilient. So, yes, the last few years have been tough, certainly Brexit and COVID hit hard, but we’re seeing more and more demand for this type of product, and it’s becoming more mainstream than it ever has before.
PRESENTER: And is that because property prices are going up or because incomes are going down?
SARA ROBINSON: A little bit of both, a little bit of both. You know, I think of my own parents, they didn’t spend more than £4,000 on a property and when they passed away that sold for nearly £200,000. And that’s the same right across the board, rising property prices, everything’s getting more expensive, but unfortunately pensions aren’t keeping pace with the cost of living so they have to look to their equity in their property.
PRESENTER: Ashley, you mentioned COVID, are there any knock-on effects from that period, 2020/2021, which are now, you’re seeing coming through the market today?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course, and I think the major one we’re seeing right now is interest-only maturities from the extension that they may have had, and we’re definitely seeing a greater number of clients come to us looking for a funding for that reason. But it’s not only just the COVID changes or anything really, what we’re seeing is more people who have potentially not saved enough for retirement or maybe are helping that family member maybe come over that COVID period. So we’re definitely seeing a need, not coming just from COVID, but we’re seeing more clients from that area.
PRESENTER: And, Sara, I suppose that does raise the question of, if you can release equity from your house, that’s great, but as an adviser you must be saying well there’s some cases that it makes sense to do that and there’s others where I think that might be a slightly frivolous use of a mortgage?
SARA ROBINSON: When advisers sit down with clients, any decent adviser isn’t immediately going to go straight to equity release. There’s all sorts of alternatives they should be looking at: downsizing, do they have savings, have they taken their tax free amount from pensions. They should be looking at all those alternatives before they actually get to well you’ve discounted all those, equity release does look like it’s the right route for you. In terms of whether it’s frivolous or not, you can advise a client. But in terms of your own belief, whether you think it’s frivolous or not, that’s down to you. Over the last 14 years of being in this industry, I’ve spoken to clients who’ve released funds to buy shares in a racehorse. Now, this was a gentleman that he was single, never been married, had no family, loved race-horsing and that was, you know, he spent his twilight years following these racehorses he’d sort of semi-adopted round the country. But certainly in the last few years, you know, during Brexit and COVID, we’ve seen more of an increase in gifting. And it’s intergenerational gifting. It’s maybe not even the next generation down, but it may be the grandchildren. You know, a huge increase in university fees, getting the younger members of the family on the property ladder, that’s where we’ve seen a big increase.
PRESENTER: And, Ashley, is there also an element to this that if people are gifting money, they’d actually like to see it being spent and enjoyed rather than thinking I’ll never get to see any of this?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Well, hundred percent, and I think also with what we’ve had through COVID, people want to see their children, that the bank of mum and dad or the bank of grandma and grandad want to see them enjoy it whilst they’re alive. But also the perception maybe of rather than receiving bricks and mortar, which it traditionally always has been, maybe passing the wealth down early has seen to be very, very much popular and definitely on an increase from what we’ve seen probably for the last year or two now. Which is a really exciting point, because it opens up equity release to a whole new division, not just to those typical products where it is needs-based, it’s massively moving into that aspirational need as well, and that obviously fills the boat of saying well, you know, my son, my daughter, we need to get them on the property ladder, let’s maybe give them a bit of wealth now and see them enjoy it in the twilight years.
PRESENTER: We’ve talked a little bit about the economic backdrop and some of those other broader issues around advice and how people want to spend their money, but in terms of the market itself, Ashley, equity release, lifetime mortgages, there’s periods where they’re more in favour, less in favour, where are we at the moment, what’s going on to really underpin it?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: I think it’s two-prong really, and as I mentioned earlier aspirational needs or needs-based driven advice is two different avenues. I think really what’s driving it now is more the awareness of equity release. So, especially looking after the region that I do, I think that more holistic financial planners are getting into this market. So rather than it just being traditionally a broker market, we’re now showing that holistic financial adviser that advises from the start to the finish what this product can do. So where we have always been OK well traditionally debt consolidation, home improvements is always a very much large factor of release, we’re now looking at it more of a different way, where clients may say OK well we may look at taxation planning or we may have a different avenue. So more and more people are entering the product than there ever has been, and it’s opening the doors to more clients than we have ever seen.
SARA ROBINSON: It’s becoming more part and parcel of people’s retirement planning, because it’s become more mainstream.
PRESENTER: But are you seeing, Sara, more people with more qualifications, so if someone’s watching this and they’re thinking well this is a really interesting area but I wouldn’t feel confident just leaping in with both feet now, what’s out there to help you as an adviser that perhaps wasn’t there five, 10, 15 years ago?
SARA ROBINSON: I think there’s certainly more in terms of what the brokers in the market, the lenders, like Ashley, are doing to help those advisers who are newer to the market in terms of more structured learning. There’s a lot of support out there. Organisations like the one that I’m associated with, we’ve certainly brought on advisers who are very immature to the market as well as very experienced advisers. And sometimes your inexperienced adviser, they’re more sponge-like in terms of soaking up all that knowledge than maybe a more mature adviser who’s perhaps a little bit set in their ways. As the market has changed and the products have changed, you do have to move with the times as an adviser. And it’s certainly a role where you’re always learning, you’re never static and absolutely know everything that’s going on.
PRESENTER: But given what you’ve said there, it sounds like there’s a bit more complexity in the market, there’s more choice, how do you keep on top of that, is that getting a bit overwhelming?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, absolutely. The lenders don’t make it easy for advisers to keep up to speed. You’ve got interest rates that are either going one way or the other. Certainly there’s a lot of innovation over the years that I’ve been in the industry, so things have changed. So they’ve certainly become more client-focused plans than they ever were before. They were quite structured, quite rigid; they’ve become far more flexible over the years. Which has made it better for clients, but of course advisers are always having, they’re always being kept on their toes, let’s put it that way.
PRESENTER: Well, picking up on that, Ashley, one of the big themes at the moment, and it’s ongoing, is the dreaded Consumer Duty.
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Yes.
PRESENTER: And what Sara’s suggesting is real ability to bespoke outcomes for clients. So can you talk us through a little bit of that, what are some of the things that you’re thinking of as a provider when it comes to Consumer Duty and how that can help advisers and their clients?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course. So obviously with Consumer Duty, which is going to be implemented on the 31st of July 2023, it’s been in conversation now for almost a year. What we want in this market is a good client outcome, but what Consumer Duty does is adds an extra layer of support for the end consumer. So rather than just talking about a good client outcome, what we need to facilitate, and this is not just from a provider but also an adviser, is that a client from start to finish needs to be recorded and labelled correctly. So even if they don’t purchase a product, they need to make sure that they go for the right avenue, everything is done to the best interest of the client. And really what we’re doing is protecting this market. We want this market to continue because it’s a great solution for the end consumer. But with this extra support, from the extra support that we’ve had from the Equity Release Council and now adding the FCA Consumer Duty on, it’s just providing that client with that extra security.
PRESENTER: OK. Now, Sara, you mentioned interest rates are always moving around, and certainly after a long period where they’ve been very, very low, rates have been going up, so how has that altered the dynamics of the market and the appeal of equity release?
SARA ROBINSON: I think over the years that I’ve been in the industry, clients have become a lot more savvy and they have become a lot more rate driven. So of late we have certainly seen clients approaching us and then saying oh maybe the time isn’t right. That’s nothing new. It’s always been very much when the time is right for the clients, not for us or certainly not for the lender. As a wise old colleague of mine has always told me, the one with the highest interest rate isn’t always the worst and the one, with the lowest interest rate isn’t always the best, it’s what that interest rate can do for you. So, those clients, who Ashley’s already mentioned and referred to, who maybe have interest-only mortgages that are maturing and certainly no repayment vehicle to clear that off and are now under pressure post-COVID from the bank or the building society to pay it off, you know, getting rid of that mortgage, maybe being able to retire, clearing it via equity release, yes, they may be paying a slightly higher interest rate than if they’d have done this 12 months ago, however, I come back to the flexibility of the plans in the future, if the interest rates come down, with this market you’re not stuck with that plan.
We talk about lifetime mortgages and it gives the impression that the client is stuck with that for their lifetime, but like a traditional mortgage, you can always look at re-broking if the interest rates come down. I know as a lender that’s probably not something Ashley likes me to talk about, but that’s the reality of the market, rebroking it when interest rates come down, very, very attractive for a client. And we certainly do an annual review with our clients to see whether we can help them, whether they’ve still got the right plan for them.
PRESENTER: Ashley, what are your thoughts on that and again if rates are going higher, does that make it less attractive for you to lend as much, more attractive?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Well, I guess, if we look at historical rates, and that’s what we need to do rather than just look at a period where we’ve been in ultra-low gilt percentages, but if we take a historical view, we’re averaging out where the market’s traditionally always been. Now, don’t get me wrong, when we see higher interest rates, especially from a provider, people question or they decide well is it ready to defer, as you mentioned, and then we talk about maybe the cost to defer. So from a provider sense, for us, we’re pretty much all very much competitive. It relates to the LTV, so the loan to value size that the client may be able to take. The higher LTV obviously gets, the higher the APR. But, as a provider, I think we’re very much understanding of where the gilts are right now and we have to price effectively. But I do believe that where we are right now is a good point and the gilts, if they may drop or they may go up, we will have to price effectively.
PRESENTER: And how much time do you spend thinking about, when you’re underwriting this, there’s obviously the repayment terms, there’s also the capital value of the property itself, so do you have to take a view on where you see house prices going?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course. I guess for us though what we have to take into account is that this is a lifetime contract. So typically if we look at maybe what Lloyds have published or we look at a downgrade to the property index, that’s only short-term. So when we take into account our back book and how much properties we look at, it’s quite a lengthy period. So yes obviously when we have to value the property, say from today, we look at what the value is today. And the valuers that we send out to clients’ properties may take that into effect. But I guess it’s crystal ball gazing isn’t it, we can’t assume what the properties will be worth in two, three, four years’ time. On our KFIs, we stipulate an increase and a decrease, but when we talk about looking at it from today, the valuers would go out to the property and value it on today’s rates.
PRESENTER: Sara, get your thoughts on that, do you ever get people worried that, either think they’ve got a fantastic deal because they’ve borrowed more money and then their house price will go down, or worrying that at that point they’ve borrowed a lot more against the value of that property than they felt comfortable with?
SARA ROBINSON: More often than not, when you’re meeting certainly a couple, joint clients, you will tend to find that one is very gung-ho about equity release and then you find that one member of the party is a little bit more sceptical and they’re usually quite concerned about potentially what will be left as an inheritance for the children. What you tend to find is that when you sit down with them and you’re putting your fact find together and you’re making your recommendation and you’re trying to get a rough idea of what the property may currently be worth before submitting it to the lender, they’ll always say ah well the one that went for down the road, you know, they haven’t got as big a back garden as us or we’ve got a nicer bathroom suite and that sort of thing, and it’s trying to educate a client that actually the valuation is based on the square footage and where it is in conjunction to maybe commercial property, etc.
So, yes, there is always that little bit of an inkling, certainly with a couple, at the back of their mind, well what could be left, and you usually find that one member of the party is perhaps reining in the other member if they’ve got quite ambitious plans and well no let’s not take that much, and quite often you may find, after doing your initial fact find and going back to making your recommendation, they’ve perhaps reassessed the figures they’re looking to borrow. They’ve had a further think about it and maybe perhaps reined in some of their grand plans.
PRESENTER: Well, coming back to that on Consumer Duty, obviously consumer outcome is incredibly important, but if you’re dealing with a couple, as you’ve said, that’s two people, so any tips there on how you make sure that there’s genuinely a consensus rather than one person steamrolling the other?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, because you can end up sometimes feeling a bit like a marriage guidance counsellor when you’re sitting in between the two. That’s not an uncommon situation to find yourself in. Give them time. You know, you have to sit there, give them all the information, give them the time to consider it. You can’t steamroller it, you can’t apply any pressure, you’ve got to go at their pace. Ideally we like to do face-to-face appointments so we can sit in front of them and sit there. They’re in the comfort of their own home, they feel comfortable, rather than trying to do it on a phone where you’re trying to do it over a speakerphone and that doesn’t always work, so certainly face-to-face is an ideal situation to be in.
PRESENTER: And, Ashley, we’ve talked a little bit about some of the trends in the market, but one thing we haven’t touched on is typically the size of loan that people are taking out. Are you seeing any changes in that?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: We are. Right now we are anyway. So, if we take a trend from our book anyway, typically in the market, if we take it as a whole rather than geographical area, we’re probably looking at around about a loan to size value around about 124,000. Now geographically that does change, but what we’re seeing right now is around a 70,000 take, so initial is around 70,000 to 72,000. There are many factors for that. The majority of what we’re seeing right now is that I think with the way the world is people are just taking their bare needs. So rather than, I’ve looked at earlier, aspirational lending, they’re saying OK well needs right now are I’ve got to pay an interest-only mortgage, let’s just take that now. But also what we’re seeing is people move from products.
So what we’re seeing is traditionally a lump sum product is probably our widely taken product where drawdown comes second, in our business anyway, but recently we’re now seeing people take more of a drawdown solution. So what they’re saying is OK well we’ll take this right now, but we’ll have a larger drawdown reserve. Because with us, at Pure, when you take a drawdown it’s done at prevailing rates. So what they’re saying is well we’ll do bare bones, we’ll pay an interest-only mortgage that we need, but we’ll have a bit in the background or we’ll look at maybe bolstering our retirement lifestyle with, say, 100,000 in a drawdown reserve. So we’re definitely seeing perception shift right now.
PRESENTER: OK and, Sara, are you seeing similar trends?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, initially we get a lot of clients that have been approaching us over the last six or seven months wanting to borrow the maximum that they can. And of course you have to start reining them in because that has an impact on the interest rate they’re going to be offered. So I would very much concur with what Ashley says that clients are taking the minimum but having that back-up plan of a drawdown in place. And that’s mostly driven by the cost of living, you know, increasing gas and fuel prices, food prices, they’re on fixed incomes perhaps with state pensions, maybe small company pensions, they need to eke out that money that’s sitting there for the future. If they need it, they need it, if they don’t, well great, there’s going to be more left in the property for the family to inherit at the end of the day.
PRESENTER: And just coming back to COVID and trends there, Ashley, any sign that, there was mania for home improvements when everyone was in lockdown.
ASHLEY SAMPSON: There was.
PRESENTER: Has that run its course now and what about the need for holidays, just to get out?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course. No, so I think what we’re seeing, home improvements will always be one of the largest reasons, but we’ve seen recently an actual downward trend to that. So we’re seeing more people take a lifestyle look really. So when everyone came out of COVID, they’d been in their house for a year and a half, they wanted to improve it. We’re now seeing that shift now. So we are seeing other things take over. So holidays are definitely one thing, lifestyle planning is another large proportion. But we’re also seeing other factors on the large increase too, so purchasing a property using equity release, taxation advice really on the large and gifting too. So home improvements has always been a core root of what we do, but recent trend shows that it is on the reduction right now.
PRESENTER: Just moving - oh sorry, Sara.
SARA ROBINSON: Certainly, yes, bucket list. It’s all the things on the bucket list-
ASHLEY SAMPSON: It is a bucket list, yes.
SARA ROBINSON: -that they’ve been wanting to do for the last few years and because they’ve been stuck in their homes because of COVID, now it’s time, we’re going to do that bucket list holiday or we’re going to go and get that motorhome and we’ve retired now, we can go and have a couple of weeks in Europe somewhere or even a couple of months in the motorhome and that sort of thing, so yes definitely away from the home improvements.
PRESENTER: Sara, I want to come back, because you were talking earlier about the importance of particularly couples working out between them what they’re comfortable about, but there’s obviously other people in the family, particularly if there’s gifting involved, so I want to get your thoughts on, if you’re an adviser, how many people should you be getting involved in this conversation?
SARA ROBINSON: Potentially and ideally, you want to get as many people involved as possible. Now that can make it a little bit unwieldy for an adviser to deal with, but certainly mum and dad get the children involved because they are probably going to be the major beneficiaries, at the end of the day, so they’re going to be the ones that are going to be potentially impacted by what’s left or what isn’t left in the property at the end of the day. And certainly what we’ve all had to adjust to over the last few years of being in COVID is working with technology to make that happen. So an adviser may be sitting with mum and dad, I live in the North West of England, so an adviser may be sitting up in the North West of England with mum and dad, but the children may be down here. So it’s using video technology, whether it’s Teams, Zoom or whatever app, FaceTime, Skype, whatever, to involve the children. And that’s becoming more and more prevalent these days. Whereas certainly earlier on in my time in this industry, it was sort of oh well my mum and dad didn’t leave me anything, the kids will get whatever’s left at the end of the day, and now they’re very much more driven to involve the family and try where they can to make sure that they’re doing this in a way where the children are comfortable.
PRESENTER: Ashley, is there any evidence, if you don’t have those conversations, that you might not see problems at the start but problems can emerge down the line in families?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course, and I know there’s a stat out there that seven out of 10 FOS complaints come from the beneficiaries of the estate. And I guess, for us, as Sara alluded to, is trying to involve as many people in that conversation as possible. We want a good client outcome and that’s provided by the product. But again it comes back to Consumer Duty and also offering a good client outcome is trying to involve as many people in that conversation as possible. And we, as a lender, really try and drive a good client outcome. And that’s one that’s going to come from it is making sure that the family are well astute to what’s happening, because this is obviously a large proportion of their potential inheritance that may be whittled down. So any protection that any adviser could give is just beneficial for us as a provider.
PRESENTER: Well I think you’ve both stressed that it’s a very complex area once you get families involved and more than one person involved so there’s that element to deal with it, a lot going on in the market as well. So, Ashley, any tips for advisers on what they can use as a framework or some sort of checklist that just make sure you haven’t forgotten anything, however minor it seems at the time, that could come back and bite you a bit down the line?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Of course. So, we as a provider don’t actually provide one, but what I’d always educate and promote someone to do is to have a look at the Equity Release Council website. The Equity Release Council is a magnificent resource for all advisers and I hope, Sara, you would agree as well-
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, I would.
ASHLEY SAMPSON: -is they are massively about Consumer Duty and providing advisers with the framework to really help them advise clients, so not only is there checklists, there’s a huge amount of support on there as well. So anything along that framework or to help an adviser really speak to a client or make sure that every tick box has been exercised. Every other provider or, sorry, every other advisory firm probably has their own internal one and over years they’ve mastered it and I’m sure yourself has one, trying to really get the best out of every client situation. It’s going to adapt, it’s going to change over years, and we try and work within the same framework, but anything additional is only a benefit really to everyone.
PRESENTER: OK, Equity Release Council. Sara?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, Ashley’s too modest to say it himself, but the lenders as well have an awful lot of information on their portals and their websites. They all tend to have adviser support areas where there again a huge source of information, learning, not just Pure, but right across the lenders in the market.
PRESENTER: Now, we’ve got a couple of minutes left. I want to move on to what’s available in products, obviously quite a lot of innovation going on, but, Sara, what are some of the things that you’re seeing that really make you think yeah this is definitely adding value rather than white noise to the market?
SARA ROBINSON: Yeah, some of the newer ones, and certainly the Equity Release Council championed this, was the flexibility to be able to make ad hoc repayments. So unlike a traditional mortgage that we’ve probably all either got or had in the past, you’ve got to make those regular monthly repayments, with equity release you’re not under any obligation to do that. However now the plans do offer that flexibility, so again getting the family involved and the children listening and mum and dad paying off that interest-only mortgage have suddenly freed up some disposable income, they can help to chip away at that rising increase of the interest on the lifetime mortgage. So that’s a great one, plus the three year exemption.
So, a couple again, sorry to keep coming back to couples but it does tend to be that way, usually find that when one of the spouses passes away, that’s when the one that’s left behind tends to think well this house is too big, it’s full of memories, perhaps I want to go and move, live near one of the children. Three year exemption: if you decide to sell up and move and repay the lifetime mortgage within three years of death of a spouse, you’re not going to get hit with any early repayment charges. So again very much client-focused, the client doesn’t have to, no knee-jerk reaction, they’ve got time to think about is this the right time to sell up and move, and decide what they want to do.
PRESENTER: But on that, if you’ve got an older contract that doesn’t have that on, are you going back to clients saying you should rebroke this, or are there times where actually some of the details and the deals available in older contracts, just because it’s old doesn’t mean it’s a bad contract?
SARA ROBINSON: Yes, absolutely, absolutely. I can see Ashley smiling at me, because rebroking from one lender to another, when I’ve got a lender sat next to me, is a bit of a contentious issue; however, yes, there will be some that do have that flexibility, some that don’t, but you do have to look at the bigger picture because there are fees and charges involved in moving from one lender to another. You’ve got to take all that into consideration and weigh up the pros and cons and, again, get everybody involved, all parties, children, clients, the lot.
PRESENTER: Ashley, a couple of examples of innovation there, what else do you see that’s coming through at the moment that you think is a value-add?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: I think the main one is where the market’s moved for property criteria. So if you take a couple of years back and we have a look at what the criteria really looked like, it would be your average three bed semi-detached in Surrey would be perfect for a lender. But what we’ve really worked hard at is to really try and broaden the horizon. So, just to give you some examples where some properties may have been disregarded many years ago, products now can encompass maybe 100% flat roof or large acreages, so previously we may have looked at maybe 25/30% flat roof, products now and a lot of them on the market can look up to 100% flat roof. So what the market has really done and strived to do is not just to give the property to probably a really good resaleable property in the future, but really try and open and broaden the horizon to try and encompass as many properties as physically possible. Now, there are a couple of instances where that’s not applicable, near to commercial is a big one in the market, but we’ve really worked hard, not only with some people that internally fund but also external funders, to really try and grow this market, not just offering features and functions of the product, but trying to allow more people to access this.
If we talk about product functionality, from the 28th of March 2022, the Equity Release Council brought in a new standard that every product going forwards must have the overpayment facility. And typically in the market they range from 8 to 12% per year, we have a product which allows 20 or 40% overpayments. So it’s really broadened the horizon and given clients that functionality to say if you have the ability to, you can overpay, rather than saying OK you don’t have the obligation to but if you would like that option to maybe look at the compound effect or pay a little bit more, you have that option now. So we really have strived and I think the market should be hugely proud of where we’ve come from.
PRESENTER: Well, we are almost out of time, so I just want to get a final thought from each of you, covered a huge amount of ground, just one key message to leave us with, what would that be, Sara?
SARA ROBINSON: If you’re an adviser and you’re looking at this market and thinking about joining the market, certainly do your research, you’d be warmly welcomed and it’s very much a growing market and an exciting one to be involved in.
PRESENTER: Ashley?
ASHLEY SAMPSON: I think from where we stand, it’s a really positive market to be in. We are throwing education at as many advisers as physically possible to give them the tools, the utility to really try and implement themselves in the market. It’s a great place to be. It really works in holistic financial planning, especially when we’re talking about the later life decumulation phase. So for any adviser that’s not currently in the market, really, really like to see you take the exam, get your permissions, and once you do them the support is ongoing. We have a great marketing toolkit to help anyone proactively market and any questions are always welcome.
PRESENTER: We have to leave it there. Ashley Sampson, Sara Robinson, thank you both very much for joining us.
SARA ROBINSON: Thank you.
ASHLEY SAMPSON: Thank you.
PRESENTER: And do stay with us, we’ve got some information coming up in just a second on how you can use this as part of your structured CPD.
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