Rising test rates and living costs are tightening borrowing power, even for clients with good incomes and strong equity. On NZ Adviser TV, Rustam Nomozov, owner and adviser at The Mortgage Lab and a winner in NZ Adviser’s Top Advisers 2026, explains why serviceability is now the biggest challenge he sees and how careful preparation keeps clients moving.
Nomozov outlines the three principles behind his approach – listening, preparation and persistence – and why he writes each application as a proposal that tells the client’s full story. He explains why a decline from one lender is rarely the final answer, and how restructuring a deal or finding a better credit policy fit can change the outcome.
Nomozov also discusses working with first home buyers, self-employed clients and investors, why he sees approval as the starting point rather than the destination, and his focus on client education in the years ahead.
00:00 - Rustam Nomozov
Sometimes in different situations, one lender might decline the client, but it doesn't mean it's no.
00:03 - Kylie Speer
Hello and welcome to NZ Adviser TV. I'm Kylie Speer, and joining me today is Rustam Nomozov, owner and adviser at Rustam Nomozov Mortgage Lab. Rustam has been named as a winner of NZ Adviser's Top Advisers for 2026. Welcome to you, Rustam, and thank you so much for joining us today.
00:23 - Rustam Nomozov
Hey, Kylie, and thank you so much. It's very exciting to be here. I didn't expect to be selected this year, but hopefully, you know, did some hard work last year and been recognized. Really excited, really happy, and a bit like a bit nervous, honestly.
00:41 - Kylie Speer
Please don't be nervous, Rustam. I promise you are amongst friends here at NZ Adviser TV. Well, first off, Rustam, congratulations on being named one of NZ Adviser's 2026 Top Advisers. What does this recognition mean to you, your family, and the clients you support?
00:58 - Rustam Nomozov
Yeah, also, personally, it's a big achievement for me personally as a business owner as a and an adviser. I've been as a working as an adviser a couple of years now, and I think it's a it's a big milestone, personally. The bigger thing is it's a family, family and my clients. But you got a family, they've seen all these long hours, late phone calls, work on the weekends, and they've been behind my back supporting my kids my kids and my partner. So, as a father of five, I do understand how financial security and home ownership it means a lot to our clients. So, it's a big shout out to my clients trusting me with the making important or probably major decisions in their lives, like buying a house as buying a businesses or building investment portfolios. So, it's it does mean a lot.
02:00 - Kylie Speer
What principles have guided your success and helped you deliver strong lending outcomes while continuing to provide quality advice to borrowers across New Zealand.
02:11 - Rustam Nomozov
Cool. Awesome question. So, I probably can say that the principles my work based I got couple of principle what my work based on, right? So, the first thing is the listening. So, without listening, we do not understand where clients are coming from, what's their background, what they're trying to achieve. Cuz the decisions they make when they work with an advisor, depending who you are. For example, first home buyers, they're making major decision to buy their first family home. And it's very sensitive, it's very nerve-breaking sometimes, too, right? So, without listening to them and understanding where they want to be in the future, I think it's very crucial. Working with the investors, we need to understand where they're coming from, what's their long-term goal is, as what how many properties they're trying to build, how they see their retirement. So, there's a lot of questions in the background. So, without listening, I think it's impossible to start our job cuz this job is not just transactional. You have to understand what what's behind. Second principle for me is a preparation. So, I will tell my clients I write a proposal. It's not just an application couple of lines here and there. It's actually a proposal. Sometimes can be a feasibility study, right? So, if you want to put it that way. And again, putting stuff on a paper, what you see on a paper say it's an application or application, sometimes they do not cover the whole story. So, the listening and then interpreting the listening into the paper and writing a story of the client, I think is a crucial. And um num- probably the last one is the persistency. Cuz sometimes in different situations, one lender might decline a client, but it doesn't mean it's no. So, I normally tell my clients my job is not here to get you a no. My job is here to get you a yes or how, yeah? So, again, it's maybe sometimes rewriting your proposal, maybe changing the structure, or finding a lender whose credit policy or which credit policies use my clients better.
04:00 - Kylie Speer
Rustam, you've said that mortgage is about more than simply securing an approval. How does your focus on structure, cash flow, and wealth creation influence the advice you provide to clients?
04:14 - Rustam Nomozov
Getting an approval is important, but I see it's a starting point. It's not a destination, right? So, mortgage remains in place for over 20 30 years and can have a major impact on a client's lives. For example, when we work with the first home buyers, priority comes as whether repayments are manageable, maintaining emergency funds for them, like and understanding how we actually we can build an equity in the future if they decide to buy an investment property. When we deal with a business owners, again, sometimes what we see on a paper it doesn't reflect the true story, right? So, we have to go slightly deeper. In as a solution for them, it can be separating personal and business lending, managing variable cash flow, refinancing expensive debt into something cheaper. When we dealing with investors, for example, it's how we can assist them to buy a next property and build that strong portfolio that can sustain our long-term market fluctuations. So, my role not only to arrange the mortgage in here, it's to help client make the mortgage work as a part of their wider financial planning.
05:30 - Kylie Speer
What lending challenges have stood out over the past year, and what have they taught you about the evolving needs of borrowers?
05:40 - Rustam Nomozov
I think probably the biggest challenge we see at the moment is a serviceability. So, it impacts wider range of the clients, whether you have a good income or strong equity, it's challenging with the current market. Banks assessment test rates gone up, living costs gone up. So, So, it's a careful preparation and realistic planning with the clients makes huge difference at this stage. For example, with self-employed clients, they also face challenges with the cash flow. Or, for example, their financial position of the last year doesn't reflect whether they can afford lending now. So, we have to be really careful and go through the numbers together. So, this all what I mentioned above reinforces that when we working with the bank and the clients, it's again listening to them. It's putting stuff on a paper and testing it with the clients. Testing with the means whether it's a lending supports the borrowing. Well, I mean, whether income supports the borrowing. Whether do we have enough equity, right? And it's a putting in the plain language for the clients and the bank, particularly in the changing market. It had made its quality advice more valuable at this stage. So, I see clients are seeking for quality advice and long-term strategic relationships.
07:05 - Kylie Speer
And finally, Rustam, as you build on this recognition, what priorities and opportunities will shape your approach to helping clients in the years ahead?
07:15 - Rustam Nomozov
Yeah, so for probably for the future for next year, my goal is to help more first home buyers enter the market we call it with a confidence. So, I want to support investors to build more sustainable portfolio so they can overcome different market ups and downs. And helping businesses to sustain particular rough economic patches at this stage. And continue working with the clients and I see them to build their wealth through the property investing and appropriate mortgage structuring. I also see the opportunity working continue working with clients and educating them. So, education it comes as a big part of my advice. I do produce a lot of training materials, ebooks for instance, or different weekly like Instagram or Facebook posts, so different materials. I run different seminars for the client just to make sure they educate the cross across the borders. They know what's happening with the mortgage market. They know what's happening with the property market. I do put big impact into myself as a educator, advisor, financial educator. I am part of the property investors association um by the Wellington region. So, I'm trying to be try to know the market, try to know what's happening with the economy, so I can actually my advice is relevant to the clients. And there is I see another opportunity is adding additional value to clients through providing advice in a KiwiSaver space, for example, home insurances, personal insurances, making sure clients holistically protected. So, whatever happens with my clients, whatever life brings, we do have protections measures in place to sustain that long-term up and downs.
08:52 - Kylie Speer
Well, thank you so much for your time today, Rustam, and huge congratulations once again.
08:57 - Rustam Nomozov
Thank you, Carly, so much, and I really extremely grateful to New Zealand Advisor for being selected and for putting all this amazing information or platform online, helping customers, our clients to make a right for the working with trust trusting the advisor industry. I see you guys doing amazing job, and I've been big follower for years, following who like what advisors achieve, how they achieve it, learning from them, and I'm very stoked very stoked to be part of this list this year, and hopefully it just goes up from this year, and we'll have more clients to trust the advisor industry and work with us and hopefully build the wealth uh long-term wealth. Thank you, Kylie.
10:08 - Kylie Speer
We are stoked, too. Thanks, Rustam, and thank you, of course, to our viewers who are watching the latest episode of NZ Advisor TV. We look forward to seeing you again soon.
