The Future Of Mortgage Broking: From The Man Who's Seen It All

Welcome to Beyond the Numbers with Christian Stevens. My guest today is someone I've known for a long time. A huge advocate for the broken industry. He's done a lot for so many people. Peter White, head of FBAA. Welcome. Thanks Christian, it's my great privilege to be here with you today. This can't be a lot of fun. I actually asked you just before we came in here and I didn't even know the answer to this question. You've been with FBAA now for 20th. Just on. 23 years? Just on. Yeah. Wow. And what would you do before that? So I cut my teeth in the 70s in banking and finance and base have spent my entire career in the industry. So I originally stepped into retail banking. So I was there at one of our big four banks down on Newport Beach having a wonderful time in New South Wales. It was a great era. And then ventured off into finance companies wound up in investment banking and non-banking here. I was I set up the first sales office for Ames home loans, budget 1993. Wow. And then wound up with Mark Boros in wizard and his first foray into into mortgage breaking and then doing some consultancy and brokerages of my own, which then sort of led me into the early days of FBAA where I was state president for New South Wales in 2003. And I took over on that's the wrong word. I was asked to step into the role of what they called junior vice president and then senior vice president, which led into national president and chairman of the board. So that was in the back end of the 2000 year. So from 2007 to 2010. They were all volunteer roles. And then in 2010 onwards I was asked to also take on, you know, addition to what I was doing the CEO role. So full time, not volunteer work, which the other roles were. And so there I stayed and wound up with various titles of executive director and land adventure managing director. So there we are today. I've been breaking for seven, eight years. Yeah. So you've been, you know, the FBAA for most three times now. You've seen, I would imagine some big changes in the industry. When they, you first started, I would imagine that was getting things by facts. And these days obviously the wave of AI coming through. What are, like, what are some really key moments in the last 23 odd years where you've seen the biggest change in our industry from your perspective? Sure. So I might ping it a bit before that. When I first started banking, finance. Yeah. I was there when the first olive-eddy computers were put into the Commonwealth Bank. And they were things that were as wide as this desk and probably as deep and shuttered and banged and clanked as you put in a passport and went, zip, zip, zip, printing your data into it. And I was also there when the first hole in the wall, the first ATM machine was installed in New South Wales. I was at the entrance branch a few years later. There's been some significant changes since then. So in the broken sector, I first became a broker in the late 90s in a time where brokers were very much scorned upon. They were not trusted and particularly not trusted in regional markets, twice in my brokerage as a broker in country New South Wales. I kind of think back to, was that a smart move or not? But I was one of the first in this industry to advertise on TV. And I did it as a collaboration between a whole lot of businesses, predominantly medical dealerships, that were doing little bits and pieces. My broader together is a clapped river under my, my broken business to put a high level of advertising onto television. And from that period on television became a bit of a thing for brokers to go into. But there are very early days in very fragmented industry and regulation changed and involved. And this is one of the significant changes from what was the U-Triple C and part of that it was the triple C, so the consumer credit act. It came with the uniform consumer credit code. And now into the NCCP, the National Consumer Credit Protection Act, they are significant milestones in our industry. And a lot of people sort of made scripts ahead of me. So why didn't you talk about regulation being major milestones? Well, they were because each step was an improvement in the industry. Because what was happening in the past wasn't that good. And especially the NCCP and then the best interest duty. These are two very important milestones in our industry to actually build our future. So the NCCP came into being because the U-Triple C was being fragmented by states. And those that wanted to bad were finding the weakest link in the chain around the country and going through that to keep doing business. So if you shut down here and all of a sudden they'd pop up there. And that was just not on. And the FBWA was the leader of advocating change into the NCCP. Others followed after that were the first saying, no, you need one piece of legislation federally to ensure that people don't try and those that wanted to bad don't try and get through any gaps. And look at the end day it was called the Finance Broke Act. That's what it's a original name, what's not NCCP. And a part of our conversations back in those days and far there for me to be too outspoken. That's a different story. We change the thinking and saying, well, you just can't cover finance Broke. And because finance Broke is the turn for our industry. People talk about mortgage breaking general though. But that was the point. That was the general capture of the industry. Then everything else was a subset under that. So with mortgage breaking, finance broking or commercial breaking or asset breaking, they were the subsets underneath finance broking. That's what it's called the Finance Broke Act to start with. We bought it into NCCP because we needed to make sure that lenders were also captured under this into this framework because everybody was involved in consummate it. So the NCCP, NCCP became a very fundamental pivotal point in our history. And then the best interest duty. And as much as everybody hates more rules is probably one of the best things that has happened to the Broke Ring sector. Both for today or when it first came out and into the future because a bank can't say they act in your best interest because they don't. They only have one product line that they're allowed to promote and that's the bank's product line. They act under the banking code of conduct. But they don't act under the best interest duty obligations as to brokers. And that's such a foundation piece of the value proposition to consumers in today's market. So I think there's some of the keys. I'm sure there's many more. I say there's key. If it's interesting lead into my next question, I was on finance and coffee this morning as I found myself off it on there. And there was a poll up around discussions with MFWA FWA for concerning or things are broke as a finding concerning. And it's tends to be the three same issues for my last 10 years I've been around, which is. Well, back, clawbacks. Hey, and I wasn't there. Net of Offset. Yeah. And yeah, general conflict. And chunk of it. So your first two of the things that we've been advocating for change on for a long period of time. And so clawbacks and net of offset commissions. We did research, gosh, it must have been about a year and a half, maybe two years ago, where we saw that there's a 342% increase in brokers not getting paid their commissions on net of offset accounts up to 12 months after the money been used. In some cases, they've got paid at all. So that's just unacceptable in everybody's terms. But it's also linked to the conversations around clawbacks, because that's all about remuneration as well. So from day one, when clawbacks were introduced into this industry, a long time ago, it was done for a certain reason. One of the reasons was churn of portfolios, right back in the beginning days. And what people were doing, getting a portfolio of $20 or $50 million worth of loan is saying, I'm going to take from this lender, put it to that lender, because I get paid another upfront. Now that wasn't what it was meant to be about. Today, when we talk about clawbacks and churn, most of the times when people use the word churn, they have the definition of it fundamentally wrong. It was about portfolio movement. It was never about acting in the best interest of the client, the one client. So some people say, well, you're moving this person out of this loan and into this loan at month 14, you're churning that client. Well, that's not churn. It's the long you are acting in the best interest of a client. The clawback conversation in the papers and discussions we've had with government. And also remember, three and a bit years ago, I was the first person ever to get a federal minister to turn around and support a conversation around fair route comes on clawbacks. Never ever happened. That was the Honourable Stephen Jones. We did a webinar on that and it was promoted and promoted on a national basis. He was the first time ever. Otherwise, no politician or regular one to have that conversation. So we worked a lot over the last three and a bit years with Stephen. Many, many papers. We had stakeholder engagement in our boardroom. So we had a boardroom lunch with him and key people that were present on that July of last year. I think it was Stephen wanted years, I hope you can say this on your podcast. Stephen wanted our top 10 shit list. So we gave it to him. What was the top two? Well, back's native offset. And Stephen was all on board for that and then he left government. So today we now have the Honourable Dr. Daniel Malini. know I've had two meetings with him and waiting on a third to be finalised with his chief staff at the moment where we've spoken about the issues around clawbacks and that back in the net of office and so on. And he's all up for it. But as is typical with any federal minister, he knows nothing about it. Right? He doesn't. Most people that know I do. But the thing in government is that when you change ministers, the past knowledge is not transferred to the new incumbent. And that's done so there's no conflict of interest in the whole case of reasons that government puts with it. So what was done in the past doesn't transfer automatically or largely to the new minister. But the new minister said he likes him in my colloquialism. Like the work that Stephen was doing supports what he's doing and wants to continue that conversation. So we've had two short briefings on it. We've got a more in-depth meeting to have. Hopefully that'll happen in the first three months of 2020. Ask what the like what is the solution? The solution is what what's your opinion on what the situation should be. So it's never about getting rid of it. Yeah. Personally, I don't think they should exist at all. But that's my own personal opinion. From our industry, association and professional point of view, it's there for a reason and an appropriate reason. So long as it's appropriately measured. So there's three things that need to happen. And that is it needs to be fair to the lender. They're renting the loan. They've got infrastructure costs blah, blah, blah. So it has to be fair to them. It has to be fair to the consumer because there are conversations from banks saying, well, if you want to reduce the period of clawbacks or modify that, we're probably have to push the rate up to the borrower. That can never happen. And third and certainly not least of all, it must be fair to the broker. The broker did the business. They were engaged to do a job. They did their job. It was done. They got paid their money. It should be bugger off and hands off sort of thing. I've done my job. It shouldn't have somebody in your hand in your pocket for upwards of two years. So that is completely unfair. So somewhere in the mix of all that, is a position says, well, he's what is possibly fair. Now, pegging the sand was simply this. And the peckness hand is to start a conversation. It doesn't make it the end result. But it was to say, clawbacks should not go longer than 12 months and the broker should be left with something. Rate the deal. Nobody reimburses a broker there expenses. Pay all this money to get a loan done and all their infrastructure costs and etc. When clawback happens, nobody says, oh, by the way, he's reimbursing the exp percentage of your cost. It doesn't happen. And we are all small business people. So it's a big rip up for industry and for brokers. So by saying, cut off at 12 months, and the reason for the 12 months is to say, well, if it happens inside of 12 months, something was wrong or something very unexpected happened. Either don't take this wrong, the broker screwed up or alternatively, the lender screwed up and they jacked their rates by 2%, which caused the movement. Or they had a windfall. They had a lot of wind. They had a death in the family with a large inheritance. They moved overseas. Things that are outside the brokers control, which is why the brokers should be left with something. After 12 months, well, this is when the best interest duty starts to apply in a more profound sense saying, well, I'm going to health check everybody on annual basis. There may be a market impact of change that then all of a sudden says, well, I need to look at this soon to the later. So month 14 or 15, I'm there going, wait on, you really need to move this around. This lender has price creeped. You're interest rate. So it's ratcheted up over 12 months, unlike others. This lender doesn't have that sort of underlying philosophical movement. So maybe this is an option you need to consider. Then you go through the motions of the pros and cons. I think it definitely depends on the client type as well. I want question. Yeah. Read my business partner does a lot of professional investor clients. Yep. And they often work with buyers agents. And there's a whole dialogue with a lot of leading buyers agents around, refive every 12 months, cashier equity out by again, the whole philosophy of building wealth through properties change from my parents was paid on your own. I'll keep out of home, have a debt freehouse. And that's success. Whereas now it's like leverage equity have incompargizing assets at a retirement. The whole psychology of building wealth has changed. And I feel like best interest you need net of offset clawbacks. A lot of that isn't in line with what is being pushed from a message perspective becomes an inhibitor. Yeah. So I've had a conversation a couple of times that it's like, I hear you. I understand what you're trying to do, but refiring client every 12 months and making a clawback is making it working for free. That doesn't actually work. Well, I guess and there's a balance in that. So to me, one thing is a client not refinancing and disappearing out of the system as far as clawbacks are concerned. The other is on a refinance. I think we philosophically need to probably look at it with different lenses or in a different way understanding that if I refinance a client of my own, although I get a clawback, I get a new upfront and that too should hopefully balance themselves out, maybe put a few shuckles in the tin. It doesn't help to pay the cost of the run of the business. But what it does do is create the longevity of the trial. So the trial will continue. It won't disappear because the two replace each other. So in a refinance of your own transaction is not as bad an outcome. Is somebody refinancing your deal that disappearing or a life event that you have no control over happens and all of a sudden you're getting clipped so he said, "Hey, wait a second. This is way outside of my control. Why am I being penalized for something like this?" So there's a few different pieces in that puzzle that need to be thought through, which is why it's not necessarily an easy clear cut and answer, especially when you're talking with government because you need to position all these things appropriately so that they understand something that they don't do every day. But also isn't being being promoted as a more of a business commercial reality rather than a practical reality that is beneficial to the consumer. So in today, government and regulators aren't interested in you or me as business people. What they're interested in and what all these revolves around is impact to the consumer. So everything has to be in the consumer benefit, otherwise it never plays out, which is why this conversation takes forever. Let's talk about channel conflict quickly because I think we can probably spend a couple of hours on that. But let me just first say, I actually have an experience and I'm almost in matter of this myself. Like, yes, obviously from time to time here and there. Definitely been some situations where they've taken the absolute piss. But mostly it's been absolutely fine. I mean, two thoughts about this right because at the end of the day, a bank is a business. They have, they are accountable to their shareholders. The reality is they have to work at broker. It's not like they want to work with brokers. They feel like maybe I'm a quarry or a couple of other lenders. I do feel like it's a forced relationship for a lot of them. When you started with FBW, what was the broker market share? Do you even remember? It would have been around the 35, 40% mark. Now it's pushing one was 80, 77 or 76. Yeah, the Baderall stat, but yeah, it's up there. It's a question that has continued to grow through all that throughout that time. But the thing with channel conflict is that it's really the domain of the major banks who have retail distribution branch networks. The second tier is the non-banks. They're not involving this conversation. So unfortunately, it's hit around four whether they like it or not. And some play it well, some play it don't. And if I go back to that era, especially when I was at a company called Financial Direction, so I was in private banking at the time. We had a wholesale, the vision that was looking at business lending and all that sort of stuff. Your channel conflict really didn't exist because there was a recognition that the broker was adding value to the system. Now when you think about the system and the flow of mortgages, the reality is what one bank loses from here, another bank generally gains from because around 80% of all lines are going to the banks anyhow. And what that bank loses go to there and there to there. And it just flows around the same pond. So I kind of need to get over themselves. Because they're going to lose some, but they're going to win some. Because that's just the way it works. They shouldn't be engaging their branches to proactively give deals that are not readily available through the broker network to offer it to a consumer that walks in the door. That should not be allowed. Because that is, in my mind, any competitive practices. If you look at a inquiry as an example, and let me go full circle on this before I get shot by the State Manager of a query, their policies are not unbelievable. The interest rates are not unbelievable. But they consistently deliver an exceptional experience to broker. It's fast turnaround. And that's pretty much all they've done for 10 years. And year on year, it is outrageous how aggressive their book is growing. And I saw it article the other day that they think that they might be in the top four within the next 24 months. That alone says to me that the collaboration of a competition mindset of bank versus broker, like surely that's a use case that the big four could look at and say rather than trying to compete when we're clearly not winning, why would we not work with them instead? I agree. And you've probably got a whole lot of legal with food sitting in the banking system. So you should do that or marketing teams that are all getting up certain twisted. But you test them before it's all about share. holders, profit on return on investment, is those sort of things that sort of tend to play out louder. And a lot of the posturing we see in media in my mind is more around the capital markets as much as anything else. And they're just trying to make sure there is confidence across everything rather than people getting a bit nervous and jewellery on market share. And I feel that, you know, Macquarie in my mind has the right recipe for success and that's obviously proving out in what they're doing. The major banks need to balance their thoughts and understand that way back in the early 90s and even potentially into the late 80s when brokering first started, it was there to deliver cost effective and efficient volumes into the banking system. Right. That's how aggregation started. It was all about you train them, you look after their commission, you control them, you take responsibility for them because we don't want, you know, back in the day, 5,000 brokers banging on our door with 5,000 different questions, you handle it and then I've only got 10 questions sort of thing. So everything is put in place for the right reason. The thing that irks me and I said in the 70s, I cut my teeth with a major bank, the major bank. Not to me anyway. I look at it today and go, I'm really disappointed with the attitude today. Yeah. Here is an industry that helped build you to what you are today, same with all the banks. And yet you want to go down this path of channel conflict to offering deals that are just not acceptable elsewhere. I've had this conversation with government and regulators. How can a bank justify saying to a consumer? Well, you're currently on, I'm just making numbers up. You're currently on 6%, but I know you've been spending your broker. I'll do your five and a half and I'll give you some money in your bank account too. But they wouldn't offer that through the broker channel. That's just wrong. Right. And creates a false economy that's a race to the bottom. It achieves nothing of value. So therefore that sort of behavior to me is completely unacceptable. And they're the things in channel conflict that hurt me and it still happens across the industry. I mean, we're now over 22,000 brokers in this country. It doesn't take a small percentage to create a lot of numbers that are having the problem. So yeah, we can spend a few days on this. That's okay. You mentioned recently that you think the industry is in fairly good shape. But it keeps you up at night still. There's not a lot that keeps me up at night, be honest with you. The big challenge in my mind is ensuring that, well, hopefully ensuring that brokers aren't taking shortcuts. In an industry where it's full of paper warfare, back in the day, you mentioned facts machines before. Many people may not remember what they are. They were telek's machines before that too. And there. But the paper warfare, as such, whether it's physical or digital, is still a lot. And the compliance obligations through Lenders checklists, which is their actions to be responsible to RG20 and I'm responsible for learning obligations. They become quite onerous. And you think you've done everything and you miss something. You say, "Oh, wait, I thought I got that, but I missed it." But people who deliberately take shortcuts, and there's very few in the industry there, the things that concern me the most because the one bad apple ruins the whole barrel, if you like. Now we don't see a lot of that. But every now and then it crops up. It becomes really problematic. So it's always something when I'm talking to people. So don't take shortcuts. That's the thing that probably concerns me the most. In addition to making sure they meet their compliance and governance obligations by law, they have very, very important. But that's generally what covered by aggregators and lead brokers, a group such as Flint and so on. You guys all do a wonderful job with that sort of stuff. We try. I'll tell you what, there's three times you're not a paper warfare that when I started. Yeah. That's the idea. That's why two of you have the paper warfare. It's a lot. And if you're starting out as a new broker trying to get to navigate what is a very complex ecosystem is a lot difficult. And this is why training and mentoring is so important. Yeah. So make sure that we have a good mentor in this industry. It sucks. I think it's completely broken. Yeah. So we're actually looking at that as we go into 2026. We're looking at the whole mentoring ecosystem. Yeah. Yeah. Back in 2010 when the NCCP began, there was some framing by Asick around that. Yep. They then removed it. It's a sales response. We'll see you later. Enjoy. And it's sort of all form apart from there. I've seen price ripped off where people have been charged for normal amounts of money every year. Never written alone. Yeah. The mentor is just ripping them 15 grand or something like that and they're getting loans from their parents to pay for it. All these sort of horrible things that come up. It's not just one. There's quite a few stories, quite many stories on that. But then there's also the understanding of the what is the mentor actually meant to be doing. Yeah. And what is that for? It's no framework for that. Great. So we intend to build it. Yeah. But that is the thing that becomes the challenge in the marketplace because there's a whole lot of variations on them and a whole lot of different opinions to what it should be or shouldn't be. So it's not an easy answer, but it's certainly one that needs to be had and that sector needs to be fixed for the benefit of everyone. And I think if you ask 10 people, you get 10 different answers. Oh, yeah. What they think is what I, what Reem and I think a modern broker needs from a skill-set perspective is very different to what I needed when I started. Yeah. It's interesting just to see, like, how to broker the other day to the, like, the cert and the question. I was like, who wrote this? It's updated in 30 years. But yeah, it's just interesting how disjointed some of the education is for new to industry given that the average broker is average. Yeah. And I think though there are some very good people in the mentoring sector, but your point that you made for in which is what our concern is, the framework's broken. It needs to be pull apart, look at and re-put back together again to create something that's a value and what was the intent of mentoring and what it was all about, but needs to be all about in today's marketplace, which has changed from 10 years ago, certainly changed from 20, 30 years ago. Yeah. Let's quickly talk about your order of Australia, because I think that's firstly pretty incredible recognition, right? I don't know your humble person and you probably wouldn't talk about this unless I brought it up. But can you talk me through, I guess, how that happened? Because I know you were heavily involved with the advocacy for us. And most people probably don't understand the levels that you went to to fight for our industry, but it is something that I admire and have a lot of respect for. But I'd love you to maybe just give me a quick little rundown of how that happened. Thanks, and I appreciate your words on that. So in 2019, I was awarded an AM, a member of the Order of Australia by, in the Queen's Birthdays Honours List, with the name. And an AM is for significant service. So you see a lot of OAMs. People think that's, you know, that's high up. It's not it's the first run on the latter. So that's not putting it down, but it's for service. It's not for significant AMs in the next run up. There's two more above that. And so it was awarded to me at the time through. It's a closed process. So I didn't know it was going on. These people have to support whatever is put forward as an application and recommendation for. And you don't, my understanding is you don't sort of go into that process thinking, I'm going to achieve this category. You just go in and then those that review are the ones that decide where you, or you land. I should say false, probably a bad word. So at the time, so that would have had to have been in 2018, that was a bit together. So we had the Haynes Royal Commission happening all the time. There were a whole range of papers before that through ASIC, A3C, Senate inquiries. And so on that were all happening in the background before that. Together with my work that I started in 2016 on mental health advocacy, how I approached that, where that journey led to from the industry. So in 2016, now I want to talk about mental health. I put myself out and said, why suffer from it? This is what it looks like. I've got family members, corporate members. We need to shine a light on this. Today it's a commonplace conversation. It's no longer a mystique or a taboo. Conversations for us, progressed into the wellness hub, which is all about providing actual solutions to help people. But that conversation I started back then was a part of, I guess, the framework of the AM that I was awarded. Plus, what I was doing here and overseas, both industry-wise and mental health advice. These conversations I was having at the time together with my own personal charity that I was running. For parents and care as a special needs children and their mental health and the conversations they need to have, they need to have without being put in judgment of. Because quite often parents with special needs kids get in a very stressful environment and just need to say things that most people would say, you can't say that. But they're getting it off the, it's a pressure valve that's releasing. So anyhow. So this was the combination of things that led up to that and why that was put in place at that point in time. When the governor awarded me the medal, which is an interesting ceremony, very typical government style of process, the comment was made to me on the quiet, this is why you're being given it. It was all about the mental health I was doing in the foundation of charity. Together with what happened in the industry. If it was only about the industry, it would probably be conceived well, it's an OAM because you're doing your job and you're doing your job. doing it well. That's good. But these things are all about what you do above and beyond what people see, above and beyond the line of what, above and beyond what people expect you should be doing. So all about the extra. And yeah, there you go. There's a snapshot of the order. Mental health. Yep. Something that's very close to my half. And yours obviously too. What do you think we can do better as an industry? I know you said it's a regular conversation, but I do still feel like it's not as regular as it could be outside of you. Are you okay, Dan? What not? I think on a more consistent basis. What can brokerages do and brokers do to kind of. Sure. So we talk about all the time. So it's not just the International Means Day, Women's Day, are you okay? It's far far more than that. It's in every conversation that I have. But from a business point of view, I think you need to embed mental health awareness and support into your everyday business culture and into your policies and procedures. So it's cemented as something as a must do, not just when you think about it. And you need to support and engage with your staff regularly around that subject. So there for a bit of a delay, we have somebody coming once a month, who's there, if you like, as a counsellor, for people who want to go have a chat and go have a chat. There's no pre-bookings either, probably these days, but it was just an open door policy in strict confidence. But that just meant people, our staff could just talk to somebody who's not an employee and not your boss and have a very open conversation. No, it's been dealt with privately and confidentially. And those are the sort of things I think work well for staff knowing that your employer actually does give a shit about you. They're doing the extra things that I don't have to. But also have framed it. So there are definite processes that you can go through to talk about any issues or hassles you have in case, you know, right now, I mean mental health is all about what's you're largely what's impacting you in your life. And a lot of it we think is personal things, it's not it could be bullying and harassment within the business place. You've got psychosocial hazards now starting to be introduced and laws that frame around that that create greater problems. So it's not just a personal thing, it's a business environment. That's why culture is so important. If you get that culture right, then that will help to support people in what they're doing. And you'll just want to because you want to, right? It's not something you think, oh, I got to do it. I want to do because I want to. When you think of culture, I always thought it had to be these big grand, you know, off sites or something that was, you know, pretty big. But one of the things that's had the biggest impact on our business is toasty Tuesday. Yeah. So I'll normally go out to five dock or a lane code deli and get all the different cuts and meats and cheeses and everything else. And we do, you know, and and fresh for cars, and whatnot and then do the toasty Tuesday. Tuesday, it's just been a time where people can kind of come together, chat, not talk about work. And it's funny because watching that each each week and it's being getting bigger and bigger, something so simple has some of the biggest impact on our culture and our business. I think a lot of people think when they think about culture or mental health, you know, it's going to cost a lot of money or you've got to implement big, huge change. Sometimes the simple things have the biggest impact. Hit it right on the head. It's the little things that count. And culture is all about family. Right. And how you deal with people in your family and the environment that that is. Some people say, you know, they're at war with their brother or whatever they did. But look, it doesn't mean you always get on. But it's the underlying ethos and philosophy that you have as to how you treat people. So what you're doing with toasty Tuesday is exactly what culture's about. You don't do it for any other reason because you're one on. Yep. Right. You want to treat people like people like a party you're family. That party you found, you probably spend more time with them than you do with others in your family the other day. Yeah. So it's important that you balance that out and have that part of that balance as a part of not having to talk about business is sharing a meal is having a drink and that doesn't have to be alcoholic drink. Yeah. Yeah. Having that time where you step away from the norm and treat yourself like people rather than a process. And again, we do a whole host of things with our staff on team building days. And we do a few things that are offside as well. But it's all about getting together. And I think every Friday sit down and have a meal together. At least have a, you know, an afternoon tea and those are the sort of things that do make a fundamental difference in a business over and above that the process driven things that you need to do. This is what gets culture right. And yeah, a lot of people try and build a process around culture. It doesn't exist. It's been human. It's been a person. It's actually caring and giving you shit. That's what counts. That's what builds culture. Work life balance. Yep. I think it's an interesting lead into this next question. Broking's hard. When you start out as well, you're doing everything. I know Brokers are working for 14, 15, 16, 17 hours a day. They've also got families. They're not present as a partner or a parent often. There's a sacrifice there. I'll come back to that question in a second. But what do you do outside of work? It's not work related that you enjoy. Because I like, you obviously, I see you as head of FBAA and a senior figure in the industry. But what do you do with your spare site? Is there anything you enjoy? I'll be like everybody else. There's not a lot of spare time. But the thing is that, and I actually spoke about this last Friday night at an event I was at, but also something I talk about regularly, is that it involves a part of the mental health conversation. And quite often when you're feeling high anxieties, which is my greatest challenge, as well as depression, and I've been there as well. But you need to find that release. Like so find your piece. So my piece is writing big motorbikes. So I have an Indian Springfield. It's 368 kilos of 1900 CCs. Raw awesome. It's a buzz of a big bike. It's a big bike. And I love big heavy bikes. The bike I had before that tried to kill me twice when I was going through depression. So it had to go. It was a little bit lighter, a little bit lower on power, but it was built for race. So that was it's hard to help out while it was built. So yeah, that thing tried to kill me twice. You do road trips? Day road trips. Yeah, I don't like doing overnight one so far. King Little Bit Oloh got given me issues at times. The thing I said is find your piece. It doesn't matter what it is. Mine is writing my bike. Whether it's surfing, skiing, gardening, bushwalking, it makes no difference what it is. But whatever you find is where your piece is, you need to do it and do it regularly. Especially when things start to get a bit dark. And the sooner you jump into that, the better because it gets too dark too far. It's really hard to get out of that nose dive. Winston Churchill termed depression as the black dog. And it really is a little botched on the ass. And it will hurt. And it's hard to get rid of that lock jaw. So I've rough toes? Yeah, I do. Yeah, I do. And it's always sparked. There's something that's causing it. There's always a cause to what it is. So whether it's stress at work or whether it's disappointment in people, I find times that can lead into it or whether I'm overthinking something. And all of a sudden, I get a severe anxiety attack and I just can't move out of a chair. So this is why I do about finding a piece. The thing that breaks the cycle for me with the anxiety is to get off my ass and do something different. So whatever I'm doing at that time, and it doesn't matter what I'm doing, but whatever I'm doing at the time, I need to get up and do something different. And all of what does it helps your mind to break the cycle of whatever was going through your head. And also, you'll reset fairly quickly. So there's rough days and be keen to say there's not. I went through a period about a year and a half ago for almost eight months. Whereas one long rough day. Yeah. And there's stuff going out at the moment where it's tough at times. But, you know, you're saying life wasn't meant to be easy, but it's worthwhile. It's got any advice for anyone who's, you know, got some bad anxiety or depression or just not feeling their best. Yeah, find your piece and go do it. It's a very simple thing. It's not hard. It's not complicated. But again, people tend to not put the right level of energy into that thought process. So, you know, some people in my life playing golf, great. If you can't get out and go on the course, go to the driving range and smack a few balls. Whatever it may be. But do it. And enjoy it and let your mind be absorbed by it. I mean, the one thing with motorbike riding is trying to hold upright a big, heavy, powerful motorcycle. Takes a favorite of concentration and effort and a lot of core engagement. People would be surprised you may have an exercise you actually get out of riding a motorbike because they, especially when you're hitting the twisties. But it takes so much of your sensory capabilities to actually do what you're doing. You forget about everything. And that's a part of it. Do something you enjoy. Forget about everything else. Because tomorrow will come. Sun will shine. You need to keep going. Sure. So you need to break that cycle and keep doing it. And of course, if things get really bad, don't be afraid or ashamed to go and get professional help. When I went into depression a couple of years ago, I went and got professional help from a counselor, a psychotherapist, which I had no idea what one was. The psychologist uses hypnosis as a part of the therapy. A few jokes are up. and that I won't do them today, but it's done. But it was the best thing I ever did. I came out of that screaming on top, and never looked back since. I have top-up sessions and so on. It is a very, very good thing to do. And if you're Sydney, wrong one, Penn Halligan, go say, "If you need the help, but don't be afraid or ashamed to reach out to someone a professional to get that help." You probably find it's the best thing you'll ever do. - I'd fallen out of my original business partner about 12 months ago, and I remember at the time, look, I was pretty hard on myself about the situation because I put so much energy into it and hadn't worked out. And then I started doing the 10,000 steps each morning. - Yeah. - Lost 10 kilos. But what was the biggest thing about that was being a better partner to my wife. Like we go together, and then I was more present in the rest of the time that we were together. Also just getting outside, getting a bit of fresh air, clearing my head. I noticed the matter of weeks, how much impact that movement had, just getting out of the house, or getting off the couch, or getting away, and finding something that you enjoy doing. And I still do it religiously now, but I also do the 100 days of drinking from New Year's Eve, I've been that for seven years now, and again, another huge change in my mental capacity and motivation, but do you do, like exercising and all you're moving? - Well, the bike is significantly an exercise, I'll give you a tip. And yeah, make sure, move in straight up, I wear an aura ring that monitors my movements, and also I'm probably in my sleep. - I'm about to say sure. - That I get good sleep, and what are the things that I do that impact and create bad sleep? - Right, so give yourself a sleep better. - How do you sleep better? - I don't eat late at night. I prefer not to have meals after 6 pm at night. Can't always control that. I don't drink at night if I can avoid it. So I don't drink a lot anyhow. I used to, I used to drink bourbon till the cows came home. I drink very little these days. So I try and measure those things that, yeah, no meals after 6 pm, or it's at 6 pm, but I finish by seven, so I think. Don't drink at night. Make sure I down tools like computers and phones. They say three hours, I generally write about an hour before I go to bed, and go through those routines and make sure that I'm comfortable. I like to be cool in my bedroom. I don't like to be hot, so I make sure the temperature's right. So those things all measure to give great night sleeps, or much better night sleeps than to get whether it's deep sleep or REM or whatever it may be to get those better outcomes. One of the things I wanted to say though, that you touched on being present, right? For people, and especially for brokers giving how, given how busy life is, being present in the moment is fundamentally important. Now that could be like this, with a business you're doing a podcast, don't be distracted by other things. It could be in a business meeting, don't be distracted by laptops or your phone, or whether you're just with your partner, making sure that you're not distracted by anything whilst you're with them, that you are focused on them. And I found being present in the moment, was very, very calming for me, 'cause I always tend to be distracted by things at times. Too much technology, watches, phones, tablets, laptops, it would always be going. So being present at the moment, I think is fundamentally very, very important, both within business when you're having conversation, but also with your partner, personally. So it's an interesting piece that we need to focus on. We talk about work, life, balance. That being present to me is great. And also going through moments of gratitude. Do you believe in work, life, balance? Or is this what you prioritize? Oh, shit, well, it's both. I believe in work, life, balance. It all work and no play, makes Billy a dull and boring prick. No. (laughs) You've got to find it. Otherwise, where do you find your peace? Where do you find the time to do the things that you do? Where do you find the time to spend time with that person that you have given your life to? Right? I said, "I want to be with you, Flav. I'm not doing this just for the moment." This is long-term stuff, right? You've got a prioritized time for that, but you should just naturally want to have that time for that. So work, life, balance is great. I think it's very, very important. And it also reinforces in your relationship how much that person is important to you. Yep. Let's talk about the big buzz word for the moment, AI. AI. We were at the AI native Lundy event the other week. I saw you there. I think they're probably market leading in terms of where they're out as a business and what Basson and David doing. Pretty exciting. But I also think there's a long way to go. So it's an interesting one where a lot of people think if AI are replacing them rather than elevating them. And there's a human centric versus man versus robot. Mentalities. It's an interesting. Terminator is coming. What's your thought on AI? And I guess the good parts of it and the stuff that we need to think about the cause of the issues as well. So I think just reflecting on that event, we were both at with Lundy. Yep. They put on. I found it quite interesting, if not fascinating, that the four or five panelists they had that were talking about what they had built for Lundy to drive their process and their interactions with customers to get that application process flowing. All of them said the same thing. They were learning. So no one's got the answers today. They're learning as they go, which is great. But it also says it's what you did. We're early days. So we're all learning as to where this thing is going. But in my mind, it's like the sun rising and the tide coming in. Yeah, I ain't going to stop it. So you need to be on board with it. And you need to put time and energy to understand it and how that may or may not apply to your business. Now, as we look at an industry as a whole, a lot of people are very concerned that AI is going to take their jobs away. I don't believe that at all. So especially the front line from a broker point of view, I think there are probably future considerations where we have for a while outsourced processes to companies here and overseas. They are potentially probably at risk because it's a process versus then a human interaction. Even though there are interactions could be driven by technology. But then again, at the next step beyond that, there is still human interaction anyhow to get settlement to happen and conversations within the relationship that was started up front that need to be there to help finalize matters, especially if there are any challenges. So there's a piece in the middle of a slow go. That at some stage, to me, is a piece that will be replaced. You know, we're seeing with what was presented at the Lenny event that they're using that as a part of the conversation after the contact with the broker to help drive in the pay slip or that piece of information. And the dialogue I thought was brilliant and how quickly they could change the tone of that dialogue was quite funny. But that's that piece of trying to get it to application stage to be lodged. Yeah. But then after that, you still got human interference. Especially in times that we are still in, whereby you can't, or with many lenders, you can't do digital settlements. I think you should be able to. I mean, we need to bring in digital discharge forms that are common across all landers. We need the digital signatures. We need digital settlement. These are, we're talking to government regulators about this because they're part of it involved during COVID through the pandemic. And then it was an interim measure and then pulled. But these are things that should just happen. Yeah. Together with the application forms at the same cross industry. They've been trying to get that for about 30 years. And it's been a long time. It's been a long time. So, I think it's been a long time. I think it's been a long time. And they're all basically the same except this one's got that name on it. This one's got that name on it. You could make that more generic and still meet the needs of each. This is my head and this is my cynicism coming up. These are legal divisions within banks trying to self justify their existence. Because it's really not necessary. Yeah. And that's why you've got the existence like I still call them American title. Title first, I think they're called where they are. It's almost like an insurance product. You pay a fee. They just settled the loan and they sort out the paperwork afterwards to try and take some of that. Anyway, great, great idea. And been around for quite a while. But you know, that's and it's because there is a need there to get things right. And the moment is just so many barriers caused by different parties and stakeholders to that conversation that prohibits it from happening. But it should happen. I think that's pretty much it. From my end. That's what you want to talk about before we finish on. I guess the only thing is I don't have to step it on before is if I was to reflect back on the past and sort of say, hey, this is something that everybody needs to take note of. Don't take shortcuts. It's a quick way out. It's a quick way to put a bullet in your head. And if you hear for a business that you want to run as a professional, just don't do it. It becomes a really big mistake. And make sure you look after your mental health. spoken of fear, but it's so important because if your mind's not clear, you can't focus on the things that should be in front of the mind for the best interest of your client, the things that should be in front of your mind that you shouldn't take shortcuts on because if there's so much paperwork and so much compliance obligations and checklists that seem to never end, that you need to be really on your game. It's why life balance is so important. You need that time to relax to make sure that when you need to be on your best and on your game, you're the sharpest you can be. I think these things are really important, fundamental to success in this industry. Outside of finding unique value propositions as to why people should deal with you and all that sort of stuff. They're fairly normal things. To me, these things, what sits underneath to make somebody successful because they're mentally and physically healthy and up for the task in front of them. Otherwise, it gets damn hard. I couldn't agree more. Peter White, thank you for your time. It's been great talking to you and I know we've had lots of chats over the last decade together and I'm sure the listeners will appreciate the conversation as well. Thanks, Christian. It's been my absolute pleasure to join you on this podcast. Thanks, mate.