None of the brokers surveyed by The Mortgage Alliance (TMA) expect business to decrease this year and only 14 per cent expect things to remain steady rather than increasing.

Over 60 per cent of the brokers asked believe that protection will be the biggest area of growth, while 28 per cent think it will be buy-to-let and 20 per cent think it will be commercial.

Phil Whitehouse, head of TMA, said: "Despite predictions of intermediary numbers falling, the results of this survey indicate that directly authorised (DA) brokers are looking to 2011 with a good level of optimism.”

The brokers were also optimistic about the levels of lending in the housing market. Less than 5 per cent of respondents think that the figure at the end of 2011 will be lower than that of December 2010 and 38 per cent actually expect an increase.

Christian Faes, Managing Director of Montello Finance, said: “We are very optimistic about 2011. It seems to us that the residential property market has definitely stabilised, and that the volume of transactions settling across the board, is increasing. Also, I believe that we will see a continuation of the trend seen last year, where bridging finance in the UK is increasingly becoming a mainstream product. Brokers that understand bridging as an integral part of their client offering, are definitely able to do more business.”

Mr Faes added that he expects the biggest area of growth to be the ‘medium term’ product.

“Many bridging finance companies seem frustrated with the constant grind of keeping funds out on a rotating short-term basis, so those with the weight of money upon them seem to be moving more towards providing medium terms products. This is positive as this should provide more choice to brokers and ultimately borrowers. However, bridging finance will continue to be the growth space for this year. As borrowers (and lenders) become more confident of being able to refinance a bridging loan, and as the product becomes generally more mainstream, borrowers will be more likely to complete on a deal,” he said.

By Katie-Jill Rowland