Emmanuel Marios is thriving.
Marios, who founded Hobart-based Derwent Finance Company a little over eight years ago, is in expansion mode, opening offices nationwide.
The Tasmania-based broker, who serves as chief executive officer and principal of Derwent, was also recently honored with the Finance Brokers Association of Australasia's (FBAA) "Tasmania — Finance Broker of the Year" award for the second year in a row at the industry group's 2025 Supremacy awards.
"It’s not something you ever take for granted," Marios wrote on LinkedIn after the event. "It’s a reflection of my team at Derwent Finance, the clients who put their trust in us and the belief that no matter how much you achieve, there’s always another level to reach."
Australian Broker caught up with Marios to find out the secrets to his success, how the industry is shaping him into a better broker and his thoughts on the market as we head into 2026.
EM: It feels great. It's very exciting.
EM: Potentially, because of my dedication. It’s a very daunting industry, that's for sure. Sometimes you can feel alone. But one thing I have learned throughout the years is that we have got such a big community out there in mortgage broking. And obviously, sharing your goals and what you can do out there can help you hold up.
EM: Absolutely they help. There’s so many different events throughout the whole year: webinars, education, conferences. Just today alone [at the FBAA 2025 "Broker X" national industry conference], you come to these events to get some golden nuggets of wisdom out of it. My partner and I were talking about it in the car. We were sharing some of the nuggets we learned today. And every time you attend these events you learn new things, and then we can bring the learnings back home and share them in the office and share them with the team and, obviously, grow with each other as brokers.
EM: Stay consistent. We all know what we need to do to be a really good broker and really good in this industry. But the biggest problem that a lot of people have — and including myself — is being consistent at times. As long as you're consistent and you just do everything that you tell yourself you're going to do, then you can make miracles happen.
EM: We're just getting started, honestly. We've had a transition within the company itself into an expansion stage. So we've got new offices opening, which is going to be really exciting. We're opening up offices nationally. We just opened up an office in Sydney; we're launching our Melbourne office. We were just in Brisbane. At the moment we have offices in Tasmania, Perth and South Australia. So we’re really thinking about our presence up here [on the mainland].
2026 is going to be our 2.0, that expansion. And the general market is absolutely going to be 100% busier. Unfortunately, inflation has increased slightly. But it’s showing that the market is going to pick up. A lot more first-time homebuyers are going to enter the market, who were in the higher income cap so they couldn’t buy it previously. So it's definitely going to pick up, for sure.
