Start-up Honey Insurance (Honey) has expanded its reach in the Australian property market by teaming up with mortgage aggregator Finsure Group (Finsure) to revolutionise the mortgage process in the country.
According to Honey, Australians have been purchasing property at a remarkable rate over the past 12 months, with more than 446,000 homes sold and more than 144,000 units exchanged. However, it revealed that a high percentage of property buyers reach the settlement process without a certificate of currency, delaying the finalisation of property purchase.
As a result, Honey entered a strategic partnership with Finsure to address the need to embed home insurance into the mortgage application using the mortgage aggregator's customer relationship management (CRM) platform, Infynity, making the process seamless for brokers and customers.
“We know that buying a house can, at times, be an overwhelming experience, and currently, a lot of the questions a customer needs to answer in the mortgage application will also be the same questions an insurance provider will ask. So, by integrating the Honey offering, it makes complete sense to simplify this and give customers precious time back,” said Honey founder and CEO Richard Joffe.
The partnership will be exclusive for Finsure, which settled a whopping $22.2 billion in FY21 and was expected to close a further $34 billion in FY22.
Commenting on the partnership, Finsure managing director John Kolenda said the offering is the first of its kind in Australia.
“We are delighted to announce this exclusive partnership between Finsure and Honey Insurance, which we think will be a game changer for our broker network and another outstanding service for the benefit of our brokers and their clients,” Kolenda added.
“Every Finsure broker will now be able to offer their clients Honey Insurance products, and with home insurance seamlessly integrated into the Infynity platform, it will automatically communicate with the customer resulting in a quote in less than three minutes.”
As part of the agreement, eligible customers will receive pre-settlement cover, meaning an additional 90 days on their insurance policy to ensure they are covered until their day of settlement.
The deal with Finsure is one of Honey's two strategic partnerships in February so far. The other agreement was with start-up PEXA Group Limited (PEXA), which offers a free and secure app to enable Australian home buyers and sellers to track their settlement's progress in real-time, communicate critical information such as payment directions to their representative, and access educational material on what to expect when transacting property.
