Don't put your head in the sand, he warns
The mortgage industry is at an unprecedented moment in its history with the arrival of artificial intelligence, but it must collectively work together to harness its power, warns the entrepreneurial founder of a London-based brokerage.
Matt Coulson (pictured), who established Heron Financial in 2011, believes the human interaction can be maintained in the homebuying process, but suggests that advisers need to embrace AI rather than putting their ‘heads in the sand’ in response to its rapid evolution.
“The moment in time that we're at right now is unlike any that we've ever experienced,” Coulson told Mortgage Introducer. “My feeling is that, as intermediaries, we've got an amazing chance now to shape it and bring it on a journey with us, as opposed to being replaced by it. My ambition is to try to help the industry as a whole maintain its position within that customer journey, because I think there is a place for human interaction. There is a place for advice, not on every transaction - I think there will be some scenarios where most things can be done via email, WhatsApp chat, whatever you want to call it. But, in most cases, I think some element of a human having a conversation with another human is a good thing.”
As AI beds in to the mortgage culture, the industry has two choices with how it progresses with the technology, in Coulson’s view – and it's not going anywhere. “The genie is out of the bottle, it's happened, there's too much money behind it,” he said. “There are too many nation states backing its rise. So it's here, it won't go backwards, technology doesn't reverse, it just continues to march forwards. You can look at it and say, ‘How can somebody think that AI can do my job?’ You either allow that to then shape the way you approach it and almost put your head in the sand, or look at which parts of the job are actually a bit clunky for the customer and the adviser. Why don't we just explore how this could be something that's going to effectively work in our service, as opposed to replacing us? If you approach it from that perspective, I think you're on the right track, because getting down about the fact that it might be here to threaten your role is not going to make it disappear.”
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How much control do intermediaries have in AI’s evolution?
From Coulson’s perspective, the mortgage industry has to embrace AI and see the opportunity ahead, because of the scale of intermediary business as a proportion of the overall mortgage market. “We are absolutely in the driving seat as an intermediary sector,” he asserted. “What I would like to see, and I think there could be more of, is a bit of cross industry collaboration in this space. I think there should be an opportunity for all stakeholders to engage in a bit more of an educated conversation on this, as opposed to a bunch of technology companies on the edges.”
Coulson, who currently has 13 advisers on the books at Heron Financial, is focused on the customer journey and the implementation of automation and AI within the process. He is striving to bring the convenience and speed of modern technology alongside a personal touch style of customer service. “I think we're in a space now where your average purchaser wants to engage in that home buying journey much, much earlier,” he said. “It's so clear to me that the traditional model of a customer wandering into an estate agent’s branch, making an offer on a house and then being moved across to a broker for a conversation about a mortgage, just doesn't feel like it's fit for purpose anymore. The advice piece should start at the point that they start dreaming about owning a home, not when their mortgage application lands. If we're going to achieve that, then there does need to be a collective effort. There needs to be a shifting in the minds of your average consumers to when they start having this mortgage conversation. We need to look at these AI tools which can help to shape the steps needed to get onto the property ladder.”
Coulson added: “If we don't, there will be technology companies, who are not the current incumbents, who will take those customers. We are in as strong a position as we could be as an industry, and we need to maximise that by talking to each other a lot more and trying to shape the future of this narrative, as opposed to being dragged along by something we have no control over.”
Using AI tools such as ChatGPT can offer an experience akin to having a business coach, Coulson suggests. “It's like having somebody then and there, in terms of the ideas which come out of it,” he said. “You think, ‘I never thought that’, and that's something that you can then take and implement within your business. We have got to have a more optimistic view of this.”
Coulson relates the challenge of AI to his own experience as a consumer other areas of his life. “The companies that I can quickly chat with at any hour of the day, where I can gather some information that's helpful for whatever product or service I happen to be interested in, makes my buying journey better,” Coulson said. “I'm going to engage with that company and I'll recommend that company, so why would it be any different for mortgage brokers? We just have to adapt and change. It will improve and you can do more - that's the beauty of it.”
