Just Retirement sales fall 4%

The firm says it remains resilient in times of extreme financial turbulence and has seen its fortunes improve on a quarterly basis. New business in the three months to 30 September 2008 hit £183.5m, down 3.8% from £190.8m during the same period in 2007. Equity release mortgage advances have slipped 15.8% to £33.1m since 2007 as the firm has increased interest rates to deal with the high volume of sales seen a year ago. Annuity sales were down slightly compared with the third quarter of 2007, at £150.4m, a 0.7% fall. The firm says annuity business has grown 5% compared with the second qu...