Award-winning brokerage led by back-to-back Broker of the Year Katie Thomas eyes national growth
Focus Finance has appointed Matt Wells (pictured, above), a 28-year Westpac and St.George veteran, as its new general manager as the award-winning Newcastle-based brokerage prepares to expand its broker team and take on more clients nationally.
“Stepping into the role of general manager at Focus Finance is an exciting opportunity to lead an already successful, award-winning business into its next phase of growth,” Wells said.
“I’m passionate about mentoring and developing mortgage professionals, building talent from within, and creating an environment where people can achieve their full potential.”
Wells spent a decade as a Westpac regional general manager across metro and regional New South Wales and served as acting senior general manager for Regional NSW and the ACT.
Focus Finance founder and managing director Katie Thomas (pictured below, front and centre) said Wells’ arrival marks a big step for the business.
“We’re building something big, and Matt is the person to help us do it,” she said. “He’s spent nearly three decades inside one of the country’s biggest lenders, running large teams and getting results, and he’s lifted team engagement while doing it.”
Focus Finance brokers have been at capacity from a lead intake perspective “for quite some time”, Thomas told MPA. The group has built its broker bench by promoting support-team associates into broker roles.
“The progression internally absolutely works. But I can’t match the pace of the lead intake to build these people quick enough to handle that intake. So we’re just getting a really good executive foundation in there to be able to open it up,” Thomas added.
Thomas noted every broker in the team was on track to write between $100 million and more than $200 million individually this year.
An award-winning regional brokerage
At the 2025 Australian Mortgage Awards, Thomas won Westpac Australian Broker of the Year and NAB Broker of the Year – Regional, while team member Maddison Brown (pictured above third from left), was named Bendigo Bank Broker Young Gun of the Year.
Thomas followed up at the 2026 Australian Mortgage Awards by winning Westpac Australian Broker of the Year for a second consecutive year, while adding Brighten Broker of the Year – Regional and Equity-One Broker of the Year – Productivity to her trophy cabinet.
