It's not rocket science!: The key to a growing equity release market

By the end of the year we should be reaching yet another milestone. However, the really enlightening figures come from the comparisons between lending growth and product options. Yes, we are still relatively small-fry in terms of total lending, and the mainstream market will always dwarf our little corner, but we are making huge leaps forward. For example, this £870m figure is nearly surpassing a whole year's output from 2014 – but it is also a 25% jump from the first quarter of last year.

In just 12 months we have added another quarter to the total value of our market, and the reason comes down to the growing choice and flexibility of the products delivered by our lenders. Again turning to the constantly valuable data released by the Equity Release Council - this time in their Spring Market Report – we see that from the opening month of 2017 to the start of this year, another 17 new products were launched in the market. This was a 24% increase on the products available last year (a rise from 69 to 86, to be exact) which aligns almost perfectly with the spike we had in lending.

It may seem painfully obvious, but the clear fact is that more choice does drive more business. In just 12 months there were more than a quarter more products available, and our customers have responded by giving us 25% more business – it's not rocket science! Essentially, the choice delivered by the market is having the desired effect. What's more, the vast majority of products are now more flexible than they have ever been. In reality, over two thirds of modern equity release products give customers the option to make ad hoc payments on their loan with no penalty, and it is this flexibility that is driving the market forward.

The days when reaching £1bn was noteworthy are in the dust, and by the end of 2018 I expect £4bn to be very attainable. But to take the lifetime mortgage to the heights I think it should be able to achieve, we need to attract new lenders who will deliver yet more products. The growth in choice is directly linked to the growth in business, as we have seen, so we need more lenders like Legal & General or Nationwide to get stuck in! L&G have shown the entire mortgage industry that the equity release sector is ready to boom, and their journey from first-timer to market-leader has been very impressive, but we need more like them.

Regardless of how much we congratulate ourselves for setting new lending records, it is the major lenders with high street clout that will take us further. The man on the street is still not fully versed in equity release, and I for one am getting tired of having to read, 'So, what is a lifetime mortgage?', every time I leaf through the Sunday papers. We need to get to a point where everybody is as knowledgeable about the lifetime mortgage as they are with traditional mortgages, and this will only come with more lenders, more products and more choice for our customers. By the next decade I think this is wholly achievable, and soon no one will be able to ignore this little corner of the mortgage market. Ultimately, if we build it they will come.