The Mortgage Professionals, National Brokers Group and The Brokerage have merged to form Vow Financial, making the combined entity one of the fifth-largest mortgage aggregation businesses in Australia.
The newly-formed group's combined business represents more than 900 brokers across Australia and had loans under management of around $16 billion as at December 2009.
Macquarie Bank holds a minority interest equating to less than 20 per cent of Vow, while the founding aggregators Peter Neustadt and Jeff Zulman hold the rest of the shares.
Zulman, who has taken up the role of Vow's chief executive, said the merger process had been lengthy in order to ensure the values and commitments of the three founding businesses were retained and built on.
"These are businesses that have grown hand-in-hand with their brokers for more than a decade. Their success is in no small part a function of the relationships that have been built over this time, relationships that needed to be respected and encapsulated," he said.
"Macquarie contributed an independent perspective and considerable experience and helped to facilitate the best structure to ensure this outcome."
Zulman said once the merger had been bedded down, value and income growth would be a priority.
"Initially, we are looking to increase value through internal growth and acquisition of other mortgage loan aggregators. Longer term, our ambition is to diversify the business into the broader financial services sector and offer non-mortgage products," he said.
Meanwhile, Neustadt has been appointed as the independent non-executive chairman of Vow.
"Vow intends to be the cause of a fundamental shift in the industry by recognising that brokers' needs are the heart of our business and brokers must be empowered to regain control of their future," he said.
