Artificial Intelligence will never replace the human element in financial and mortgage advice.

This is  according to 360 Lifestyle commercial director David Smith who told the Mortgage Business Expo 2024 that AI could never replicate what the human adviser offers.  However, he stressed that those broker firms that did not harness the inherent efficiencies of AI would struggle to survive.

MFS head of marketing Leah Brunskill agreed that in the current climate AI played an important role but one that complemented rather than threated the valued broker function.

“Only 9% of a recent 2,000 consumer survey said that they wanted their mortgage journey to be totally via AI. That shows that the clear majority of people want human interaction in what one of the biggest financial commitments of their life.”

Sikoia founder and chief executive Alexis Rog agreed that the role of the broker would remain important, however he underlined the importance of not under-estimating the speed at which AI can impact this particular market.

“There will still be a need for the broker but for 30-40% of the market for vanilla products, AI will increasingly be the preferred option. I think in the next five years there will be a big gap between those firms that have effectively adopted AI and those who have not. Those who use AI well will have a huge competitive advantage.”

Rog conceded that as things currently stand the ‘trust’ issue with AI was just not there but that would only change in time as AI developed and AI developed and the next more tech savvy generation