It has been revealed that over the last two and half years, home buyers looking to place a 10% deposit on a property have seen the number of mortgage deals available decimated by 97%. Currently only 102 mortgages are available to first-time buyers looking to place down a 10% deposit, down from nearly 3150just two and a half years ago. While it was inevitable there would be some decline in the number of deals available, the massive reduction has prompted surprise across the sector.
Ultimately it will be first-time buyers, the new blood of the property market, who will facilitate a recovery in the UK property sector. Unfortunately at this moment in time there are significant liquidity issues and many UK banks are unwilling to take 90% loan to value mortgages. Until we see an increase in the number of first-time buyer mortgages available it is unlikely that we will see a strong recovery in the sector.
It has also been revealed that in January 2007 the average first-time buyer mortgage rate was around 6.2%, with base rates at 5%. When you consider that UK base rates are now at 0.5% many people will be dismayed to find that the average first-time buyer mortgage interest rate is a relatively high 6.23%. Quite how the sector can justify such moves in mortgage interest rates is open to debate but a mystery to many.
Men in some parts of England are almost five times more likely to die from prostate cancer than those in other areas, campaigners said yesterday.
Figures also show nearly one in five parliamentary constituencies have death rates from prostate cancer that are more than 25 per cent above the England average.
The country’s 2007 average is 25 deaths per 100,000 citizens, adjusted for age.
In the worst performing constituency, Tottenham, the death rate is 57 per 100,000. But in the best constituency, South-East Cambridgeshire, the death rate is 12 per 100,000 – nearly five times less.
Other poorly performing constituencies include Leeds West and Bury North, both with 49 deaths per 100,000, Northampton North (45), Wallasey (44) and West Bromwich West (42).
In contrast, Chesterfield has only 13 deaths per 100,000, Cheltenham, Kingswood and Braintree all have 14 and Kensington and Chelsea 15.
The Prostate Cancer Charter for Action, which analysed Office for National Statistics data, said men were suffering from a postcode lottery and parts of the country were not implementing key guidance from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence.
The guidance sets out the best treatments on offer for prostate cancer and details how services should be organised.
Spokesman Dr Frank Chinegwundoh said there was evidence of some improvement but men suffered from inequality in accessing services.
He added: ‘It is not enough that prostate cancer services are improving as a whole if patients face such a lottery in the care they receive.
‘We need better services for all patients across the country, not just a lucky few. The failure of the NHS to implement Nice’s Improving Outcomes Guidance is partly responsible for these widening inequalities.’
He added it was up to the Government and NHS to ensure the guidance is implemented, so the care for prostate cancer patients ‘is no longer left to chance’.
Professor Mike Richards, National Clinical Director for Cancer, said: ‘The Department of Health recognises the importance of implementing the Improving Outcomes Guidance published by NICE.
‘We have asked strategic health authorities to submit action plans to demonstrate how they will implement this.
‘Raising the public awareness of prostate cancer is one of the key challenges for the future. We are tackling this through the national awareness and early detection initiative.
‘Also, for the first time, we have a definitive set of key messages to provide men with information about the prostate.’
Men are 16% more likely to develop cancer and 40% more likely to die from cancer than women, newspapers have reported.
Optimistically, the report also found that, while the cancer rate in UK men rose between 1975 and 2006, the rate of cancer death fell by about a quarter, which was mainly attributed to earlier diagnosis, better diagnostic methods and improvements in treatment and care.
It was already known that men are generally at greater risk than women for almost all common cancers that affect both men and women (except breast cancer). The current report looked at recent figures to see how common cancer is in men in the UK and whether there are differences in cancer rates and deaths from cancer between men and women.
What did the report find?
The report carried out many analyses and key results include the following:
The number of new cancer cases diagnosed in the UK in 2006 was similar for men and women: about 146,000 men and 147,000 women (non-melanoma skin cancers were excluded from all analyses). However, when these figures were adjusted to take age into account (age-standardisation), the rate of cancer was higher in men (409.7 per 100,000 men) than in women (354.6 per 100,000 women). The researchers say that this difference is because women generally live longer than men.
In 2007, cancer caused 29% of all deaths in men and 25% of all deaths in women. The age-standardised rate of cancer death was higher in men (211.3 per 100,000 men) than in women (153.1 per 100,000 women). This difference was reportedly due to women’s longer life expectancy and the greater likelihood that men will develop more fatal cancers.
The rate of cancer diagnosis in men in the UK rose from 353.7 per 100,000 in 1975 to 409.5 per 100,000 in 2006. However, the rate of cancer death in men dropped from 278.5 per 100,000 to 211.3 per 100,000 in the same period. A similar trend was seen in women. This is because earlier diagnosis, better diagnostic methods and improvements in treatment and care have resulted in more people surviving cancer.
The most common cancers in men in 2006 were prostate cancer (24% of all cancers), lung cancer (15%) and bowel cancer (colorectal cancer) (14%). These three types of cancer were also the most common causes of cancer death in men in 2007, with lung cancer the most common cause (24% of cancer deaths), followed by prostate cancer (13%) and bowel cancer (10%). This leaves 53% of cancer deaths caused by other less common cancers.
Overall, the rate of death from cancer in 2007 was 1.38 times higher in men than in women (which is the same as saying that cancer deaths were 38% more common in men than women). This difference was most pronounced among people aged 65 years and over, where cancer deaths were 1.57 times higher in men than in women. The rate was 1.05 times greater in men than in women in the younger (15 to 64) age group. This increased risk in men was seen for a range of different cancers.
When the researchers excluded lung cancer deaths (as men have tended to smoke more than women over the past 60 years), they found that the difference in the ratio of deaths between men and women was smaller. The overall difference in the death rate between men and women was 1.31. In those aged 65 and above it was 1.51, and in those aged 15 to 64 it was 0.98. The researchers suggest that the higher overall death rate in men for all cancers in the younger age group could, therefore, be due to lung cancer.
When the researchers excluded deaths from breast cancer and cancers that only occur in either men or women, overall cancer deaths were 69% more common in men than women. Cancers in men aged 15 to 64 were 60% more common than in women, and in men aged 65 or over they were 73% more common. The researchers suggest that these figures can be explained by the fact that cancer deaths in younger women are largely due to breast cancer and other genital cancers, whereas deaths among men due to male-specific cancers in this age group are uncommon.
Overall, men were 16% more likely than women to have a new diagnosis of cancer in the UK in 2006. More women than men in the 15 to 64 age group were diagnosed with cancer, but in the 65 and over group, new diagnoses of cancer were more common in men. Once breast cancer and female- or male-specific cancers were excluded, the overall rate of new cancer diagnoses was 62% higher in men than women, and 44% higher in men than women in the 15 to 64 age group.
Why are men’s cancer rates worse than women’s?
The researchers report that, “the reasons men seem to be so much more at risk of so many cancers are complex and still only partially understood.” They say that differences in the levels of smoking and alcohol consumption in men and women will affect the rates of related cancers (such as lung cancer and bladder cancer). They say that other factors probably contribute to the differences, such as other lifestyle factors, genetics and immunity. Health knowledge and behaviours, such as knowledge of cancer and genetic links within families, uptake of available cancer screening and willingness to seek help, may also have an effect. They say that more research is needed to investigate how these and other factors affect differences in risk.
Does this show that men and women have different quality cancer treatment?
This study did not look at whether the quality of cancer treatment differs between men and women, and the researchers do not suggest that this is a possible reason for these differences. To investigate this and other possible reasons for the differences in cancer rates and deaths between men and women, further data about the characteristics of individuals diagnosed with cancer and their outcomes will be needed.
What can people do to reduce their risk of cancer?
Men as well as women can reduce their exposure to the lifestyle factors that are known to influence cancer risk, such as smoking, high alcohol consumption, being overweight or obese and having an unhealthy diet.
The NHS offers help with quitting smoking and also free screening programmes for certain types of cancer, and men and women who are eligible should consider taking part in this screening. Men can also monitor their health and be aware of any changes that may be possible signs of cancer. The earlier a cancer is detected, the better the chance of curing it, and people who have any symptoms they are worried about should see their doctor sooner rather than later.
Homebuyers are taking the advice of mortgage experts and are moving to fix their loan rates before they rise even higher. Some 90% of all new mortgages taken out in the second quarter of this year have been at fixed rates and demand from borrowers is forcing lenders to increase rates to prevent being swamped with applications.
Figures from Legal & General show that 87% of borrowers opted for a fixed rate in the last three months compared with 71% in the first quarter of this year. ‘It’s almost a cast iron certainty that rates will continue to rise,’ said Stephen Smith, director of housing at Legal & General.
Average mortgage rates for all fixed rate terms fell during the January to March quarter but have now started to rise fast. Nationwide increased the cost of its fixed rate mortgage deals for the second time in less than two weeks, up by 0.5% in some cases, in an attempt to choke off demand. This is on top of the 0.26% to 0.86% rises announced the previous week.
Many lenders are being swamped with applications as borrowers rush to fix rates, fearing bigger increases to come. Other lenders have also hiked mortgage rates. Woolwich, the mortgage brand of Barclays, is upping its five-year rate from 4.79% to 5.29% while Britannia Building Society, Northern Rock, Abbey, Halifax and Cheltenham & Gloucester have all raised the cost of fixed-rate mortgages.
The average cost of a two-year fixed-rate mortgage has broken through the 5% barrier for the first time since January and mortgage experts are predicting that rates could soon reach 6%.
This steep increase in the cost of fixed rate mortgages is vindicating those mortgage experts who advised borrowers last summer to fix at anything near 5% for as long as they could – this when Bank Base Rate stood at 5% and 10 year fixes were available at around 5.5% to 6%.
Although these borrowers will have been out of pocket for the past six to nine months, their decision to take a long term view is now looking like a good call.
I have despaired over recent weeks as the Council of Mortgage Lenders, the FSA, then the Intermediary Mortgage Lenders Association and the National Housing Federation all put the boot into the mortgage intermediary market.
First up to the plate was Michael Coogan of the CML when he said: “The small broker community were causing problems by acting more like salespeople interested in cashflow rather than advisers acting in their customers’ interests.”To add insult to injury to the small brokers, he suggested that bigger broker firms are more customer-focused.
Then up stepped the FSA, which blamed the brokers for the lenders’ failures in self-cert and other areas – preposterous in the extreme, and giving us a history lesson of its version of where it all went wrong, yet not where it failed to see and regulate sufficiently.
Imla made similar disparaging remarks about appointed reps being better quality than directly authorised brokers and preaching to us about DAs improving their quality, etc, and then the National Housing Federation made the ridiculous claim that brokers were more of a hindrance than a help to the shared-ownership market.
This was all enough to make any decent mortgage intermediary’s blood boil and feel like the world was ganging up and blaming them for everything that has gone wrong in the mortgage market.
I suspect that, for many, the mortgage intermediary is a soft target and is where they could put the blame to hide their own inadequacies. It has been a sickening and disappointing few weeks.
Not that I claim that the broker market is entirely blameless. There was some fraud going on and bad practice involving some brokers but it was a small minority and most of those have slowly but surely been weeded out by the FSA.
But for it to go wrong, there has to be a lender, there has to be a product and the product has to be underwritten. Who introduced self- cert? Who introduced fast-track underwriting? Who was responsible for the fight for market share of the lending? Who drove pricing down to levels in the prime, buy to let, self cert and adverse market where there was no pricing for risk any more before it all went wrong? The brokers?
Brokers are a conduit for distribution. They have their responsibilities but the blame for lenders’ problems cannot be put at the feet of the intermediary market.
Every business has its minority that the rest are ashamed of and who do the honest brokers’ reputation no good but to group the intermediaries in the business into a general basket of bad apples either small or large, AR or DA, is grossly inaccurate.
The CML, FSA, Imla and others seem not to have understood that the vast majority of the intermediary market is made up of small or sole traders who base their whole ethos on long-term customer relationships, with satisfied customers providing them with introductions for business.
Ironically, it was only recently that Nottingham University Research showed that mortgage brokers and financial advisers were the most trusted people among financial services firms. What the powers that be never get is the fact that small and diverse is beautiful in the adviser world and because it is so customer-focused is why the public have more trust in them than the bigger institutions with all their bonus culture and sales targets.
It is also worth noting that the whole of the mortgage intermediary market only makes up 4 per cent of the complaints made to the Financial Ombudsman Service.
Right now. the intermediary market is shrinking dramatically. This was perhaps inevitable because of the downturn in both new purchases and remortgage opportunities.
In the short term, the lenders maybe do not need the brokers in the same way they did but in the long term they would have a problem as the simple fact is that the public do like the services that brokers offer – having someone to help fix and arrange the necessary paperwork as well as the ongoing relationships.
However, the public are rate-sensitive and want the best price as well. Lenders’ dual-pricing undermines the advice process and at times puts the intermediary in a no-win situation – so does a booking system for funds, which when you get through on the stroke of the hour tells you that there are no funds available.
How often now do intermediaries do a lot of spadework for clients or potential clients, only for them either to advise the client they had better go direct or receive a phone call from the client to say their bank has a better deal on offer?
Then, of course, there is the FSA and CML going on about how proc fees influence intermediaries. Well, not me for sure, but, in any case, the proc fees are not much different between lenders anyway. The most important thing is the fact that the deal is right for the client and then there is the important issue of getting it underwritten and offered. This is far more important than any modest difference in proc fees.
Would a transfer of the retail distribution review to the mortgage market make things better for the client? Not in my opinion.
Would it mean a further erosion of advice for those of modest means, that is, the public at large? Almost certainly. In reality, this would lead to the masses going unadvised, using the internet, local branches or whatever and the process of getting advice will be diluted even more.
The bottom line is that, whether small, medium or large, the mortgage intermediary is the lifeblood of the advice process.
Whether they are AR or DA or whatever, they have more idea of the customers need for real advice than the FSA or anybody else in their ivory towers appreciates.
Many people who form these smaller firms have experience of working for or with big business. Due to the sales practices used by big firms, many left to form their own businesses based on treating customers fairly – before the FSA even suggested the terminology – and on building long-term relationships with customers. This is not only rewarding and fulfilling for the brokers but also produces satisfied customers that produce a sustainable, long-term business.
Northern Rock has revealed how it will be split between two mortgage banks in the second half of the year.
The proposed restructuring will split the Company into two separate entities. The first lender, “BankCo”, will hold deposits, branches and unencumbered mortgage assets. The second, “AssetCo”, will be made of the Granite master trust, all covered bonds, the Northern Rock mortgage book and all other wholesale instruments.It will also hold the Government loan on its books.Both lenders will be able to originate mortgages, but “AssetCo” will have a lower regulatory capital requirement. “BankCo” will be a deposit taker.
The Government is continuing to work with the EU Commission to further prove that the state aid offered to Northern Rock was the minimum needed to enable long-term recovery, while avoiding any undue competition bias.
Northern Rock chief executive Gary Hoffman says: “We are confident that our plan offers the best way forward, meets all state aid requirements and offers significant benefit for consumers and value for taxpayers as we position Northern Rock for a return to private ownership.”
Original article by Lee Jones-26-Jun-2009 moneymarketing.co.uk
