Peter Timberlake of Legal & General, which runs the Legal & General Mortgage Club, says: “We’re placing about pounds 5bn a year of business. If it was our own money, we would be bigger than some of the well known high-street lenders.”Many mortgage clubs grew out of the panels of recommended mortgage lenders that life insurance companies’ own tied agents would use for their clients. Why do the life companies do it? Certainly not for the fees they receive. Ray Boulger, of brokers John Charcol, says: “It’s really about generating additional business for the life company.” The club gives the life insurer an additional product to sell, which could generate “leads” – names of potential clients for their insurance sales force to target.But this is not always the case. Some companies are not insurers and simply earn their money as outsourcers working on behalf of lenders. They package their own mortgages but do not actually lend the money themselves. Private Label is a mortgage packager the products of which are available only through independent financial advisers.

It was set up 11 years ago and brought in more than pounds 1 billion in new business last year.Though the lender is often hidden, the borrower will always know who is lending them money. “People like the comfort of knowing who the lender is,” says Mr Boulger.Stephen Knight, director of Private Label, says the company’s products tend to have an edge that borrowers will not find elsewhere. He cites a fixed-rate deal: clients can choose to be tied in beyond the five-year fixed-rate period, or to have the freedom to take their business elsewhere when the phase is up.Deals generated by mortgage wholesalers have to be a plus for the borrower, says the Consumers’ Association (CA). But Neil Walkling, principal researcher at the CA, adds a word of caution.

“If mortgages are offered through life companies, there is a question whether there is pressure to buy certain products which might not be suitable.”`The Independent’ is offering a free 36-page `Guide to Flexible Mortgages’, sponsored by First Active Call 0800 550551 or fill in the coupon on this page. WE ARE fast approaching our last chance to buy a personal equity plan (PEP). There will, no doubt, be a rash of advertisements from the financial services sector over the next few months making sure that we do not forget this. But just how well does the PEP you may be considering investing in measure up? A new website developed by the Allenbridge Group provides both potential purchasers and existing owners of PEPs with a number of useful tools to help make investment decisions.

The Allenbridge Group is a firm of performance analysts that includes actuaries, analysts and former stockbrokers It offers PEPs to the public on an execution-only basis. This means in practice that it can offer what may sometimes be substantial discounts on the initial investment charges PEP managers make.
For a further fee Allenbridge also offers a “PEP care” service. This is not a management service as such but a facility that will help you monitor your investment’s performance and includes a Red Alert which makes PEP holders aware of erratic performance by fund managers. PEP care includes a free helpline allowing professional help to be sought on the telephone.What makes the group’s website particularly useful to investors are the search and analysis facilities. You may browse through Allenbridge’s PEP ranking tables, searching the database in a number of ways, via fund type, investment sector, performance or just key word.