by Justin da Rosa | 23 Nov 2015

Mortgagebrokernews.ca

Lenders have had to adapt to changing guidelines, which have caused tighter underwriting resulting in delays – much to the  mounting frustration of clients as well as their brokers.

“ … I attended a lenders meeting a while ago and expressed concerns about policies versus the customer (sentiment),” Lorne Rackel, general manager with Jayman Financial, wrote in the comments section of MortgageBrokerNews.ca. “The process is all about documenting a file and the customer pays the price of inconvenience and then becomes frustrated with us as brokers.
“They think some of our requests for documents borders on lunacy.”

Of course, document demands are neither the fault of the broker nor the lender. As industry players point out, they’re merely the result of stringent underwriting guidelines that seem to apply specifically to the broker industry.

“What I find interesting … is that no one has tabled the fact that the big five play with a completely different set of rules,” Blair Goodman, financing specialist with Dominion Lending Centres in British Columbia, wrote on MortgageBrokerNews.ca. “Why aren’t our designated associations and representatives lobbying the government to demand the entire industry play by the same set of rules?”

The comments come on the heels of a number of brokers expressing frustrations about income verification requirements that have delays – and in some cases spoiled – deals.

Brokers have struggled with gifted funds, as well as seemingly insignificant bank account balances that resulted in delays while trying to verify.