“I had sold my shares of my previous mortgage companies prior to covid as I knew that, with the new financial advice provider (FAP) regime fast approaching, I would have had to spend a huge amount of time and money getting ready,” Campbell says.
“It was going to be a massive task that would have involved a major IT project as well as taking on a large personal financial risk. I though it was a great time to cash up and see what new opportunities might present themselves,” she says.
Campbell was most recently chief executive of The Mortgage Supply Co and was previously general manager of the Professional Advisers Association (PAA) and the NZ Mortgage Brokers Association before it became part of the PAA.
But she didn't have much time for idling, becoming lead carer for her grandmother and aunt who were living nearby semi-independently.
“It was an unexpected pleasure to have the time and space to care for my oldies, but lockdowns were very hard on them,” Campbell says. But after “some terrible strokes and other misadventures,” both relatives ended up in full-time care.
“In the most senendipitous timing, just as I was thinking it was time to plan my next act, I was asked to have a chat to a couple of Australians that were looking at the NZ market and who were keen to hear the 'lay of the land',” she says.
Local advisers and lenders had recommended Campbell as someone with direct experience of creating and running an aggregation business.
“Needless to say, we clicked immediately. I was super impressed by their business in Australia, Finsure, as it is the fasted growing aggregation business created by people that really understand and value mortgage advisers,” she says.
Finsure is also well-known as a leader in the tech field and has “their own amazing” customer relationship management (CRM) system.
But Campbell says it was the people above all that most impressed her, particularly chief executive Simon Bednar, who she says has “created a team of absolute stars in their fields, from compliance experts to commercial lending gurus, he has picked out the best of the bunch.”
Finsure was founded in 2011 and now has about 2,800 advisers signed up with total mortgages of more than A$90 billion in Australia, where more than 70% of home loans are originated by brokers.
“It is really powerful to be able to leverage off all the skills and experience of our Aussie colleagues and it easily translates to NZ. Our regulatory regimes and advice processess are very similar and, of course, so are many of the lenders,” Campbell says.
