Equity release lender Just Retirement’s group external affairs and customer insight director Stephen Lowe said he expected equity release to become one of the biggest growing sectors of the mortgage industry over the next ten years.

“There is a tsunami round the corner. But the industry doesn’t have the supply to keep pace with it unless more lenders come back into the market. We would like to see some of the big lenders come back.”

“When Prudential came into the market it spent a lot of money on advertising which really helped growth. Can you imagine if a brand like Nationwide joined the market? It would be great.”

Council of Mortgage Lenders head of external relations Sue Anderson said entering the market was a commercial matter for lenders, who might have questions about regulations and the way products were designed and priced.

However, she added the rationale for equity release was clearly strong: “In a world where people would have a reasonable degree of their assets in the home, particularly in later life, potentially when we look at lifetime mortgages the CML has been of the view that this is a market that could increase in the future.

“But it is not in the position to say what would make an attractive market right now.”