RAMS Home Loans Group and Wizard Home Loans have added to the rapid growth in mortgage brokers, opening shopfront branches across suburban Perth.
RAMS has recently opened branches in Joondalup and Osborne Park and is due to open further branches in Rockingham and Victoria Park in January.
The new outlets are additional to RAMS street-level head office in St Georges Terrace.
Wizard officially opened its third Perth branch, in Victoria Park, this week and will open a Joondalup branch next month with plans for a further two branches in February, including one in the Whitfords area.
Wizard spokesman Michael Zappone said the group was aiming for 10 branches by June 2004 and 20 branches by December 2004.
Targeted locations include the Perth CBD.
Several other mortgage broking groups, including Mortgage Choice, the Loans Café and Homeloans, have opened street level branches across Perth in recent months.
The new branches help to lift the profile of mortgage brokers, which already arrange about one third of housing loans nationally.
They also provide a more professional base for individual mortgage brokers, who have mostly worked out of home offices in the past.
The RAMS branches are owned and operated by local franchisees working in partnership with RAMS.
RAMS head of franchising Paul O’Regan said franchisees were attracted by the unique remuneration structure, which places the emphasis on long-term customer relationships.
Overall about 50 RAMS branches will be launched across Australia over the next 18 months.
That will still leave it well short of Wizard, which has more than 180 branches in Australia and New Zealand.
Wizard’s business model is slightly different to the other groups.
While it offers extensive brand and marketing support, Wizard does not sign a formal franchise agreement with its branch principals.
