Online and mobile banking may be the biggest digital disruptor in financial services – promising cheaper, quicker and more convenient service – but almost four in five internet-savvy Gen Ys still prefer face-to-face service when it comes to a home loan.
According to a KPMG report titled Banking on the Future, 79% of Gen Ys prefer to see a mortgage broker or head into a bank branch when applying for a home loan.
Only 11% of Gen Ys claimed that their preferred channel for applying for a home loan was through online or mobile banking. When you compare this with the 98% who indicated that they preferred online or mobile banking for day-to-day banking, it proves that the broker proposition is still very much safe in an online world.
According to the report, getting a home loan and opening a new bank account were the only two types of banking transactions in which a face-to-face channel was the most preferred. However, unlike the home loan transaction, online banking was a close second when it came to opening a new bank account.
Daniel Knoll, the report’s co-author and head of financial services management consulting for KPMG Australia, said this means “handholding might always be required” when it comes to mortgages. However, that doesn’t mean that banks and brokers can become too complacent.
“Then again, the well-utilised, fully digitised end-to-end mortgage process might be an innovation waiting to happen. Something we end up using frequently despite the fact we never put our hand up for it.”
According to Knoll, generations X and Y will dominate the financial space of the next few decades. Their share of financial assets, which sat at just 36% in 2010, will jump to 70% in 2030.
