The Intermediary – July 2025 - Flipbook - Page 51
Q&A
lending, and their recognition that we are a true
specialist lender, with a broad range of products
and the willingness to always find a solution.
How would you define Together’s
place in the specialist market?
Where we see our role is continuing to be the
dominant force that we are in this space. When it
comes to new markets, we’ve always been there
at the forefront. We were there at the forefront
of bridging in the ‘80s, and then with houses in
multiple occupation (HMOs), holiday lets and
business loans. We are always on the front foot
when it comes to meeting customers’ needs,
because we are so bespoke. We don’t just have
products on a shelf. When you build solutions as
the norm, you’re constantly gaining feedback from
brokers and from customers.
With a loan book of £7.8bn, I think we are the
largest non-bank specialist lender in the UK. So
we’re dominant in that way as well, but it’s really
about the uniqueness we bring to the market.
There are some high street lenders looking to dip
their toe in the specialist market at the moment,
but it’s just a toe. Then you have the challenger
banks, which do a great job in certain sectors,
but who do you have that does all the products
and can flex their criteria across all of them? That
defines Together’s role in the specialist market.
While lots of lenders have for many years
digitalised their offering, so that brokers and
customers can self-serve, we are a relationshipbased lender. Pick up the phone, speak to us about
ont of you and how we can
what you’ve got in front
help. No matter how big we become in the
e, we will never lose
next 50 years or more,
ocus edge.
our relationship focus
y changes
Are there any
wn the line
coming down
ers should be
that brokers
excited for?
We’re alwayss looking at our
ways
products, and we’re always
looking at how wee can tweak
and widen our criteria,
based on feedback
from brokers.
What we’ve done in
the past three months
is widen our referral
process. That means
TANYA ELMAZ
that we want to talk
to more people and be even more flexible. We’ve
also changed our product cards. Instead of keeping
them lean, we’ve outlined all our quirks and our
flexibility and shown the expansion.
This year, we’re looking at our commercial
term, how we can expand our loan-to-value (LTV),
how we might change the split of residential and
commercial to make it a bit more flexible, whether
we can use AVMs in the semi-commercial space.
We’re also looking at bridging, to define a more
bespoke refurb product.
Then, we’re looking at our place in the large loan
space. We might not be as well-known in the large
loan space as we would like to be.
In general, what we are looking to do moving
forward – and have already commenced – is
talking about our products in a slightly different
way. We want to present them propositionally, as
solutions. That means case studies and bringing to
life the impressive depth of our flexibility and the
way we construct solutions.
What are the opportunities and
challenges in this market?
While seems that we’ve had a little more economic
stability this year, what we know is that you can’t
rest on that certainty. Meanwhile, the cost-ofliving crisis hasn’t gone away, we’ve just got more
used to dealing with it.
Competitors are a challenge for each other,
particularly as those that aren’t steeped in this
market decide to show their take on specialist
finance. Everybody is looking at how they can
satisfy customer and investor needs better, and
that is fuelling growth in specialist lending.
Many more customers no
now fall into that
‘specialist’ category. It’
It’s not necessarily nonstandard any more, because the way people
live, earn money, and inter
interact with money has
o specialist lending is
changed. The growth of
an opportunity, but one that brings with it
competitor
the challenge of competitors.
‘regulation but it’s not in
Finally, I’ll say ‘regulation’,
f
the same sense as I might have said a few
Previousl the challenge would
years ago. Previously,
mor stringent, but
be around it becoming more
we’re seeing something different now.
fr the regulator
There’s an appetite from
to take another look at boundaries
mor flexibility.
and apply more
challeng necessarily,
It’s not a challenge
challeng
but we need to challenge
k
ourselves to keep
up to date
under
with and understand
it , to
sur that we move
make sure
forw
forward
correctly. ●
July 2025 | The Intermediary
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