Mortgage Choice names advice 'top performers'

In the new category of Mortgage Choice Financial Planning Franchise of the Year, the team at Wendy Higgins took out the top honours, while Anthony Kurver from Mortgage Choice Newtown won New Adviser of the Year.

Mortgage Choice chief executive Michael Russell said the awards program gives the company the chance to celebrate both high performers and the success of newcomers.

“To celebrate the rapid growth of our financial planning arm, we decided to add an additional award category to this year’s prize pool, to further recognise and reward the excellent financial planning franchises and advisers we have in this business,” Mr Russell said.

“This year’s honours list consists of a diverse and well-deserving group of individuals - all of whom have set their goals high and worked extremely hard to achieve them.

“The passion and commitment these top achievers demonstrate to their customers, business affiliates, lenders and peers is truly inspiring and it is with tremendous pride that we reward them for all their efforts.”

Speaking to ifa earlier in the year, Wendy Higgins’ Malcolm Simpson said he joined the broker’s new advice business in early 2013 because it had “a quite fresh approach”.

He added that the Wendy Higgins model, which sees him working closely with the business’s mortgage brokers, allows financial advice to be viewed as “a seamless step”.

“I thought it was an exciting model,” Mr Simpson said.

“[Mortgage Choice] have put a lot behind it: we’ve got fairly unique fee menus, we’ve got fairly unique service packages, and I could see right from the start that there was some good creative thinking that had gone into it.

“That appealed to me as a quite fresh approach.”