Actually, Mofra, only a very small percentage of loans are fixed.
I have a high percentage of customers who fix part or all of their loans, but I am literally way above the national average and I do mean way above.
I guess this reflects the amount of time I spend with a customer, whereas most borrowers get a pamphlet and 'sign here' and don't get any real explanation about loans or the opportunity to discuss how to manage them.
The fixing of the rate usually fixes the product, so if someone has spent a bit of time choosing a nice, flexible loan, they won't want to fix the darn thing and lose their deposit / redraw facility.
As with anything, price has little impact in the long term. We all want to have control over our finances, and fixing removes much of that control. In my experience, people don't fix because of the rate, but because of budget control. However, two , three or five years is a long time and much can happen in that time, making hindsight a wonderful judge of the wisdom of fixing the rate.
By the way, Pete, as you know Choice and other aggregators have recently tightened up membership requirements - the industry seems to be quite determined to be somewhat more regulated than any government requirement would impose. However, to the best of my knowledge actual complaints against brokers are few and far between. Perhaps that also indicates the quality of the customer - brokers tend to have experienced customers and / or customers who are prepared to research and ask lots of questions. I was at a seminar recently and the presenter said that by the time a customer has clicked 'enquire now' they have spent as much as 40 hours on the various websites and have a fairly good idea of what they want and are usually very well prepared for the loan interview.
This is quite different from, say, the 'typical' bank customer who has always banked with the Bandewallop Credit Union and simply walks up to the enquiry counter for their home loan. They do no shopping around as they wouldn't want to hurt the feelings of the nice customer service officer by getting their home loan from somewhere else.
There are many influences on a customer, no matter what that customer is buying. I always believed that they only thing we 'buy' are postage stamps, but now I can see that they are 'sold' to us, too.
Cheers
Kristine
