Resimac writing more prime loans and dealing with more advisers

Overall its home loan assets under management has increased by 35% to $770 million, the company says.

Resimac Head of New Zealand, Luke Jackson, said the results show non-banks are writing more traditional bank business than previously and a growing number of advisers are starting to use non-bank lenders.

Jackson said Resimac was well positioned when New Zealand first went into lockdown last year. Staff were already working from home, and non-banks were more flexible than mainstream lenders. Also Resimac had very competitive rates.

Banks have become "more difficult to deal with", he says and that has been "like a light bulb going on for many advisers."

In the past non-banks were an option when banks said no, now "banks say yes but we have a better yes."

Jackson says the past year has been a bit of a tipping point with advisers as the sector has become more confident using non-banks.

He says Resimac prime loan products have "outstripped" its other products.

However, he stresses, it is still totally committed to its non-conforming, credit impaired and self-employed products and these too have shown growth.

"In no way are we moving away from these products," he says.

As advisers become more confident with non-bank lending, advisers who rely on banks will "struggle" in the future.

Jackson says, based on what happened in Australia, the impending CCCFA changes are also a positive for the non-bank sector. 

He says non-banks are closer to their customers than big banks and can "look at people in a more individual way" rather than a blanket wide bank policy.

"We have a good personalised view of customers compared to a bank wide view."

The big numbers

Resimac reported reported normalised net profit after tax was up 87% on the year to June A$104.0 million while, statutory NPAT rose 92% compared to the previous year to A$107.6 million.

The Sydney-headquarterted group now has home loan assets under management of A$13.8 billion across Australia and New Zealand.

Resimac Group chief executive, Scott McWilliam, said; "These results reflect the momentum of our business, which has been fuelled by strong growth across our prime and specialist portfolios in Australia and New Zealand. "

"This is a clear indication that the Resimac proposition continues to resonate well with both brokers and consumers, with a product diversity and competitiveness that is unmatched by other lenders.

“Our cost-to-income ratio decreased significantly to 32.1% as our continued focus on process and technological enhancements increased efficiencies across the business. Ongoing investments into our digital transformation has seen significant innovation and improvements to the customer and broker experience across the entire loan life cycle, and these upgrades will continue via a staged rollout that is expected to complete in early 2022,” he said.

Whilst the economic uncertainty from lockdowns is expected to continue for the first half of 2022, McWilliam said he remained optimistic the economy would recover relatively quickly after vaccinations reached the target rollout, and that the strength in the Australian and New Zealand property markets would carry forward.

“Stable funding markets and lower cost of funds provide us with a runway to aggressively target further growth in the 2022 financial year and beyond, as Resimac continues to build a leading non-bank in Australia and New Zealand,” McWilliam said.