Finance difficulties don’t stop house buying

Pepper Money business development manager, Lauren Midgley, says there are more first home buyers who don’t know where they fit in the market and how much they can borrow leaning on mortgage advisers for expertise. 

“Part of our job is to educate these buyers so they are not relying on the banks.”

She says if a buyer has an impairment it doesn’t mean they can’t buy a house. “Advisers need to look at the wider options out there for clients. There are a lot of different things that non-banks offer to get these people into homes.”

Midgley says she likes to discuss scenarios, particularly if they are tricky. She recently met an adviser who had put in a mortgage application to a bank for a young couple who had found and fallen in love with their first home. They had a $13,000 credit card default, so the bank declined their application straight away.