Jennifer Nielsen, the CEO of leading mortgage broker Loan Market Group, is to become the Head of Online and Marketing for Australia’s biggest real estate franchise group, Ray White.

Ms Nielsen will resign from Loan Market Group from January 1, 2009, to head up Ray White’s e-marketing division.

Ray White Deputy Chairman and Loan Market Group Chairman Sam White said Ms Nielsen would be responsible in her new role for developing the online brands of both Ray White and Loan Market Group and improving integration of the two businesses.
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Australia’s largest independent mortgage broker, Loan Market Group, is running a series of seminars nationwide to assist first home buyers.

Loan Market Group Chief Executive Jennifer Nielsen said a seminar will be held at the Casa D’Abruzzo Club at Epping in Melbourne’s north on Thursday, December 11, in conjunction with Ray White Epping.

Ms Nielsen said the seminars would include advice on how to obtain housing finance and detail the benefits from recent changes in Government concessions, such as the doubling of the First Home Buyers Grant from $7,000 to $14,000.
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Australia’s largest independent mortgage broker, Loan Market Group, is running a series of seminars nationwide to assist first home buyers.

Loan Market Group Chief Executive Jennifer Nielsen said the first of the seminars will be held at Broncos Leagues Club at Red Hill in Brisbane on Wednesday, December 3, in conjunction with Ray White Real Estate, PS Conveyancing Connection and QC’s Building and Pest Inspections.
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First home buyers can borrow as much as $300,000 with no deposit of their own thanks to a range of Federal and State Government concessions, according to Australia’s largest independent mortgage broker

Jennifer Nielsen, Chief Executive of Loan Market Group, said doubling the First Home Buyers’ Grant to $14,000 and providing $21,000 for those purchasing newly constructed homes had significantly boosted the borrowing opportunity of first home buyers.

Ms Nielsen said cuts in stamp duty in some States and territories had also increased the spending capacity of the first home buyer.
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Australia’s largest independent mortgage broker says more than 100,000 mortgage holders are missing the benefits of falling interest rates after locking into fixed rates of more than 8% over the past 12 months.

Latest figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics show fixed rates of two years or longer were taken out on 126,054 dwellings in the 12 months to August, 2008.

Some of the major banks this month announced cuts in their fixed rate products by as much as 1.6 per cent.
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The Reserve Bank of Australia answered a cry for help from struggling homeowners in need of a substantial cut in their home mortgage rates, a survey has found.

An online poll conducted by leading mortgage broker Loan Market Group, which includes X Inc Finance, found 66 per cent of respondents believed last month’s quarter percentage point reduction by the RBA made no difference to them financially.
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Home owners have been advised to negotiate their own interest rate cut with their bank following today’s decision by the Reserve Bank of Australia to lower official rates.

Jennifer Nielsen, Chief Executive Officer of Loan Market Group, incorporating Loan Market Home Finance and X Inc Finance, said there was nothing to stop customers from being pro-active about their home mortgage rate.

The RBA cut official rates by one quarter of a percentage point at today’s monthly board meeting and the pressure is now on the banks and non-bank lenders to follow suit.
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The head of a independent mortgage broking group plans to more aggressively market the fact it is not linked to a lender following confirmation today that Commonwealth Bank will buy a third of Aussie Home Loans.

Loan Market Group chief executive Jennifer Nielsen said she was developing a marketing strategy to emphasise the broking group’s independent status.

“It’s time that started to be emphasised because clearly there’s a difference,” she said.
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While other industries across the country are facing dire skills shortages, a glut of labour is looming for the financial services sector as lenders put off staff in response to the rising cost of funding and liquidity issues.

Jennifer Nielsen, Chief Executive Officer of Loan Market Group, which includes X Inc Finance, said the US sub-prime mortgage crisis had effectively shut down the residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) market in Australia.
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Home owners have been advised to get on the front foot and negotiate their own interest rate cut with their bank rather than wait for a decision on official rates from the Reserve Bank of Australia.

Jennifer Nielsen, Chief Executive Officer of Loan Market Group, incorporating Loan Market Home Finance and X Inc Finance, said there was nothing to stop customers from being pro-active about their home mortgage rate.
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Australians are finding it more difficult to obtain housing finance as home lenders battle to deal with the global economic slowdown, a new survey has found.

An online poll in June conducted by Loan Market Group’s X Inc Finance, Australia’s fastest growing mortgage broker, found 60 per cent of respondents felt they were finding it harder to get a home loan in the wake of the credit crunch.

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Australian banks say they haven’t tightened their lending criteria, as a mortgage broker claimed that more people were finding it harder to get a home loan.

The global credit crunch has had a more severe impact on non-bank lenders, which rely heavily on borrowings to fund their loan books.

To get funding, many have had to increase credit quality by cutting riskier products or turning people away - if they haven’t disappeared altogether.

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Moves by some banks to reduce commissions to mortgage brokers will not check the growth of the increasingly important service the industry is providing to mortgage-paying Australians, according to Loan Market and X Inc Finance, Australia’s fastest growing mortgage broking group.

Jennifer Nielsen, Loan Market and X Inc Chief Executive, said her group was discussing the issue of commissions with all lenders, reinforcing to them the value of forging long-term relationships with mutual customers or borrowers.

“Lenders need to look beyond merely the commissions that they pay mortgage brokers for service and focus on the true value that a mortgage broker provides,” she said. “Research has consistently demonstrated that the people who use mortgage brokers are typically time poor, higher-value customers who invest more over the medium to long term.

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