IslamicFinance.de

Gatehouse Bank’s Home Purchase Plan (HPP) is the cheapest option available in the home purchase space for a number of the HPP products. The structure is identical in legal form to the Al Rayan HPP. The Gatehouse HPP uses a combination of freehold and leasehold to deliver a diminishing musharakah/ijarah model. Gatehouse buys the freehold title in the house at the closing of the transaction, and it is its name that appears on the title. But the buyer gets an equitable interest in the freehold by way of the contract (Diminishing Musharaka Agreement) and also gets a leasehold alongside Gatehouse. Time passes, the Buyer continues paying rent and buying further equity in the house until eventually he owns 100%.

According to the 2019 Islamic Finance Consumer Report from Gatehouse Bank, several new faith-based lending or savings accounts have been launched in the UK, but only 54% of Muslim consumers have tried any of them. Gatehouse Bank CEO Charles Haresnape sees that most people don’t really understand Islamic finance, even Muslims don’t understand it. He said that Gatehouse is intent on developing the Islamic finance sector in Britain. Haresnape predicts growth for the UK Islamic finance market, driven by the country’s expanding young Muslim population, but said awareness and education would be key factors in driving uptake.

The UK Islamic finance sector holds an estimated £15 billion ($19 billion) of assets, the largest outside the Middle East and Asia. The Gatehouse Bank is intent on developing the Islamic finance sector in Britain.

Gatehouse Bank surveyed eight different types of account: easy access, 1, 2, 3 and 5 Year Fixed Term and 30, 60 and 90 Day Notice accounts. It found average returns on Shariah-compliant savings products trumped their mainstream counterparts on all account types bar one, easy access. Overall, the average rate on Shariah-compliant products was 1.54% while the average for mainstream accounts was 1.29%, a difference of 0.25%. All but three of the 14 Shariah-compliant accounts surveyed beat the market average. Shariah-compliant savings accounts in the UK are growing in popularity, amongst both Muslim and non-Muslim savers. According to Gatehouse Bank CEO Charles Haresnape, what we’re seeing is the emergence of a genuine challenge to the UK savings establishment.

Gatehouse Bank has launched a Shariah-compliant home finance platform, enabling intermediaries to process home finance and buy-to-let applications quicker. The platform is developed by financial services software provider BEP Systems and uses cloud-based mobile-ready technology. Gatehouse Bank CEO Charles Haresnape is delighted to partner with BEP Systems. The bank currently offers buy-to-let finance and plans to roll out Shariah-compliant home owner finance through selected brokers in the near future.

UK’s Gatehouse Bank has calculated that the value of Sukuk assets listed on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) would double to GBP57.8 billion in the next decade, if issues continue at their current rate of growth. Sukuk only began life in the UK in 2007, but their numbers have been swelling at an annual rate of around 5%, though they are still little understood. Gatehouse Bank CEO Charles Haresnape sees this growth as a huge opportunity for Britain. He urges the Government to capitalise on this week's summit on Islamic finance and make it more than just a single effort for one large oil company to list on the LSE. He believes an on-going trade mission is needed to make London the world centre for all Islamic finance.

Gatehouse Bank says it is targeting significant growth in the Shariah-compliant home finance market with a new customer service centre in Milton Keynes. The Bank says its new strategy will focus more on home finance plans in addition to its current buy-to-let products and development/build-to-rent division. Charles Haresnape, CEO of Gatehouse Bank, says the bank plans to grow all areas of the business but Shariah-compliant home finance will be a particular focus. Haresnape believes this is a hugely untapped market and one that, being fundamentally ethical, will resonate with Muslims and non-Muslims alike.

London-based Gatehouse Bank has expanded its residential home finance team with two new appointments. Umar Ali joins Gatehouse Bank as Head of Home Finance after five years at Al Rayan Bank. Junaid Sarwar has been appointed as a London-based Business Development Manager. Junaid also joins after six years at Al Rayan Bank and has held previous roles at Santander and Barclays Bank. Paul Stockwell, Gatehouse Bank’s CCO, said the bank managed to build a strong team of experienced specialists as it expands into the residential home finance sector.

London based Gatehouse Bank has partnered with Kuwait based Blueprint Real Estate Company to offer finance to expats looking to purchase property in the UK. Gatehouse Bank says this forms part of the strategy of its move into the home finance business. At the same time, Gatehouse Bank announced an expansion to its residential home finance team. Umar Ali has been appointed as head of home finance, while Junaid Sarwar has joined as a business development manager.

BEP Systems has added Gatehouse Bank to its roster of financiers using their customisable Apprivo2 system. Gatehouse Bank will use the new system to help make their business more efficient. For Gatehouse Bank, BEP have re-configured their systems to comply with Shariah requirements when dealing with home purchase plans. Charles Haresnape, CEO of Gatehouse Bank, said it was vital that the software house understood Shariah requirements and BEP Systems delivered excellent solutions across home purchase plans and buy-to-let financing. Chris Little, managing director of BEP Systems, said Gatehouse Bank had seen the advantages Apprivo2 and strategic advantages would be delivered to fit their business model. He added that Apprivo2 was the fastest growing system in the UK serving specialist finance providers.

Gatehouse Bank has expanded its residential property finance team with the appointment of Mehwish Mirza as its business development manager for residential home finance. Mehwish has joined the specialist bank from Together, where she was also a business development manager and held the same role for seven years at Al Rayan Bank. She will be working across the North of England and Wales, having previously provided residential Sharia-compliant finance in the North West while at Al Rayan. The appointment comes on the back of Gatehouse hiring Sim Gill and Mehraj Bari to its residential property finance team as part of its expansion into the sector.

The total Islamic finance industry was estimated at around $ 1.9 trillion in assets for the year end of 2016, and it pales into insignificance compared with traditional finance. However of special interest is the growing popularity of Islamic finance from both the Muslim and non-Muslim financial institutions and investors. Islamic assets are very much concentrated in the banking sector which holds $1.5 trillion in total, with the Islamic bonds or sukuks worth $320 billion, and investment funds and insurance or so called takaful worth $56 billion and $25 billion respectively.
The majority are purchase and sale or murabaha and leasing or ijara transactions. Some major Gulf companies are turning to the sukuk market to raise funds, with Saudi Aramco and the Government of Saudi Arabia both successfully launching sukuk tranches which were heavily oversubscribed.

Gatehouse Bank has appointed former Shawbrook Bank director Tim Blease as its new chief operating officer (COO). Tim Blease’s previous roles include new business strategy and innovation director at Shawbrook and head of retail credit risk at Metro Bank. The bank has also appointed Sharron Harvey as its executive vice-president head of HR. Sharron has previously worked for Habib Bank Zurich and has 20 years of HR experience, mainly in the financial sector. Both Tim and Sharron will report to Charles Haresnape, CEO of Gatehouse Bank. The appointments come after Gatehouse revealed a number of changes to its board last week.

The Bank of England said it would develop a sharia-compliant liquidity tool for use by Islamic banks, to attract business from the industry's core centres. London has for some time sought to position itself as a global hub for Islamic finance.
The central bank has issued a consultation paper on a fund-based deposit model, that would help Islamic lenders to meet regulatory requirements for liquid asset buffers. It was stated, that the facility is unlikely to be ready before the spring of 2018, and it has yet to decide on whether it will develop a liquidity insurance facility. However, the tool would be a welcomed development for Britain's Islamic banks. These include Gatehouse Bank, the Bank of London and the Middle East, Al Rayan Bank and a unit of Qatar Islamic Bank.
The pricing would be comparable with conventional tools, and attractive for Islamic banks.

Gatehouse Bank looks set to expand into Islamic mortgage lending after registering two trademarks for shariah-compliant loans. The lender bought the trademarks for Gatehouse Mortgages and Milestone Mortgages last week. Gatehouse is currently known for shariah-compliant real estate investment and financing. Last month Gatehouse announced it had hired Aldermore group managing director of mortgages Charles Haresnape. Haresnape will join Gatehouse later this year. A Gatehouse spokesman declined to comment.

Charles Haresnape, Aldermore’s group managing director of mortgages, is leaving the real estate company after six years. Haresnape will be joining shariah-compliant Gatehouse Bank as chief executive. An Aldermore spokeswoman confirmed that Haresnape was leaving and said he had been instrumental to the growth of the company's mortgage business. She added that Charles Haresnape would remain in the business whilst Aldermore searched for his replacement.

Gatehouse Bank’s head of real estate David Swan has left the company.

Gatehouse Bank plc has announced its entry into the residential property finance market. With a focus on greater London, Gatehouse will offer Shariah-compliant financing solutions for clients seeking to acquire or refinance residential properties. This new product was developed following strong client demand for residential property finance solutions. Gatehouse will offer clients bespoke property finance products, from simple single residential investment finance to more complex company structures including property portfolio and short lease finance. Abdulaziz AlDuweesh, Chief Investment Officer of Gatehouse sees significant opportunities to grow Gatehouse's presence in this market.

Gatehouse Bank plc has announced the completion of an £8.6 million senior financing to support Investra's acquisition of a portfolio of five petrol stations in the UK. Based in Dubai and with an office in London, Investra is an investor of UK real estate. This transaction is the second financing which Gatehouse has completed in partnership with an equity sponsor based in the GCC region in the past six months. Investra is looking to increase our holdings of high-quality income generating assets. Henry Thompson, CEO of Gatehouse, said he was looking forward to announcing further transactions in the coming months.

London-based investment bank Gatehouse Bank Plc said on Monday it promoted Will Innes as vice president within its real estate investment team. He will work with Will Lowndes, vice president of real estate investment, and will be responsible for sourcing and originating real estate transactions across UK and continental Europe, Gatehouse said. Innes, who joined Gatehouse in January 2014, previously worked at Waypoint Capital where he was responsible for developing international private equity real estate platform.