South Australian lender HomeStart, which is backed by the state government, has managed to grow its business across the 2015-16 financial year in part due to an increased focus on the broker channel.
According to the lender’s annual results, HomeStart acknowledges “the growing strategic importance of brokers as a channel choice for customers and to further leverage distribution”.
The lender brought in 75 accredited brokers during FY15/16. This means there are now 377 brokers representing the firm. This growth was in addition to
a new aggregator agreement made with FAST during 2015-16 in which the lender garnered another 80 brokers.
Brokers managed to settle 523 new loans for HomeStart worth $138.2 million during this time period. This represented more than 32% of new lending – an increase of more than 4.4% from the previous financial year.
HomeStart also managed to increase its loan portfolio from $1,819.1 million to $1,847.3 million from 2014-15 to 2015-16.
“Focused attention was given to growing the awareness of our product offerings, particularly through the growing mortgage broker sector,” the lender said in its annual report.
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