Ipswich Building Society reports £3.3 profit before tax last year

Total regulatory capitaltotalled at£37m last year, £3m more than theyear before.In2018Ipswich introducedits ‘later life‘ range, mortgage products specifically designed for borrowers aged 50 and over.

Ipswich Building Society reports £3.3 profit before tax last year

Ipswich Building Society has reported growth last year with its total profit before tax being £3.3m in 2018, up from £3.1m in 2017 and it’s mortgage asset growth up £15m from £521m in 2017 to reach £536m.

Total regulatory capitaltotalled at£37m last year, £3m more than theyear before.In2018Ipswich introducedits ‘later life‘ range, mortgage products specifically designed for borrowers aged 50 and over.

Alan Harris, Ipswich Building Society chairman, said: “The UK’s forthcoming exit from the European Union continues to dominate the economic landscape, creating a highly competitive mortgage market.

“In response to this, we have continued to develop and offer a varied range of innovative and accessible products designed in the best interest of our members.

“While we anticipate wider economic changes, we are confident that through our business model and the additional business controls we have in place that the Society will remain secure and largely unaffected during these uncertain times.

“Our mutual model enables us to put our members at the heart of everything we do, therefore a key strategic objective is to ensure we have knowledgeable, highly skilled and engaged staff across the Society, to deliver a great experience.

“I believe that the new introductions to the board will bring immeasurable value to the society and support our commitment to helping our members achieve their long-term financial goals.

“We have always placed high value on our relationships with our intermediary partners. This year we made several developments to our broker proposition, clearly defining how we can help serve their mortgage clients and we are delighted to see that our excellent broker satisfaction rating has improved further as a result.”

The society said that its manual approach to underwriting enables applications to be considered on an individual basis and demonstrates acknowledgement for the diverse lifestyle arrangements and incomes that later life borrowers have.

The society also said it improved offering for borrowers building or remortgaging a property using modern methods of construction (MMC) and launched a remortgaging deal for those with shared ownership properties.

The society has expanded its branch network with the opening of two new and improved premises in the existing branch towns of Ipswich and Woodbridge.

Throughout last year the board has appointed Fiona Ryder as non-executive director, Trevor Slater as finance director, and Ian Brighton was promoted internally to operations director.

The society signed up to the UK’s HM Treasury Women in Finance Charter. The currentboard has a 30% female representation,which exceeds the recommended target of 25% outlined in the Davies Report.