The Coventry Building Society is to use MBT Affordability from Mortgage Broker Tools to understand its relative position in the market on affordability.

The Coventry has licensed MBT Affordability for 12 months and will use the platform to establish a deeper understanding of the UK affordability landscape.

The agreement enables the building society to run cases through the platform to test different scenarios and record the affordability results for all lenders. This information can then be analysed by the lender to ensure that its position in the market is consistent with its risk appetite.

Lewis Lenssen, managing director at Mortgage Broker Tools, said: “Our primary purpose for launching MBT Affordability was to provide brokers with accurate answers to how much clients are able to borrow, but we soon realised the power of the platform to help to advance the way that lenders develop their own affordability calculations.

“We are really pleased to finalise this agreement with Coventry Building Society and are in negotiation with more lenders on the development of a completely lender-centric affordability platform to offer a transparent and user-friendly way to deliver the insights they need to improve their affordability proposition.

“This is a positive development for lenders but it also ultimately benefits customers as it will enable the development of affordability models that are targeted more directly for the specific needs of individuals.”

A spokesperson for the Coventry Building Society added: “Affordability is a key consideration in creating competitive mortgage propositions but, until now, lenders have needed to rely on ad hoc research to understand their position in the market. The introduction of MBT Affordability turns this art into a science, enabling exact and efficient analysis of the affordability landscape, with information that will help lenders like Coventry Building Society to respond appropriately to its position in the market, and operate within its risk appetite.

“This is good news for lenders, good news for brokers, but mainly it’s good news for borrowers.”