Building societies taking mortgage fight to banks says Yorkshire chief

BUILDING societies not banks now provide the “lending story” in the UK mortgage market according to the chief executive of Yorkshire Building Society.

Chris Pilling, who formerly ran Leeds-based first direct and was a senior director in HSBC’s retail banking operation, now runs the Bradford-based mutual, the second largest building society in Britain.

Speaking after the society unveiled positive half year results and 200 more new recruits, Mr Pilling spoke of positivity in the mortgage market and said building societies were responding better than banks.

“Net lending for building societies to the end of May was plus £5.5bn, for banks it was minus £4.8bn. Wow! Building societies are the lending story,” he declared.

Mr Pilling said he was very frustrated at mutuals having to support the mistakes of some of the UK’s major banks.

“My blood pressure startes to rise at the thought of it,” he admitted.

“We are the truly trusted alternative to the banks. We are definitely seeing the mortgage market picking up, which is good.

“Sentiment is positive. The nation seems very happy at the moment, with babies, sporting achievement and the weather! But more seriously, the GDP figures do show things are improving.”

Mr Pilling said that YBS will move 1,000 staff into a new base in Leeds within months and 200 new staff, split between Bradford and Leeds, would be in a variety of roles including underwriting, case management, finance, IT and call centres.