Tributes have been paid to Cecil Hinton, the founder of Safe Home Income Plans (SHIP) who died aged 91 over the summer.
Mr Hinton launched SHIP in 1991 before it was relaunched as the Equity Release Council in 2012.
He started his career as a chartered accountant before co-founding the insurance firm Hinton and Wild with his brother John, in 1970.
Mr Hinton ran the home income advice side of the business and by 1989 they had become the UK’s leading broker, arranging more than 3,000 plans.
However, as riskier schemes came to the market Mr Hinton gathered the main providers together to create a code of conduct.
Several features of this code – such as secure tenancy for life, the freedom to move home and the requirement for independent legal advice – remain at the core of the Council’s standard today.
Mr Hinton wrote a guide for Age Concern entitled Using Your Home as Capital which was available in 19 editions between 1985 and 1995.
He also led a successful joint campaign with the charity to make home income plans more tax efficient and played a major role in exposing unsafe schemes that were marketed in the late eighties.
Mr Hinton was voted IFA of the year in 1993 at the Financial Services Awards in recognition of his work setting up Ship and remained proud of what the Council had become today.
Jim Boyd, Equity Release Council CEO, said:
“What Cecil Hinton did for our sector cannot be understated.
“Not only did he have the foresight to develop a code of conduct for the industry, he managed to devise one with elements that are still highly relevant and in use today.
“It’s not just about rules though, it’s about the founding principle that our sector must go over and above for its customers. Cecil put us on the right trajectory, one we have remained on for more than 30 years.
“Since 1991 more than 650,000 homeowners have accessed more than £46bn via members of the Council or Ship as it was first known.
“All of those customers and everyone in the industry owes Cecil a debt of gratitude for his work in those early years, which enables consumers to trust equity release is safe.
“On behalf of the Council and its members, I would like to pass on my condolences to Cecil’s family.”
Outside of his professional life Mr Hinton, who lived in Shalford Surrey, was a dedicated family man, a bridge player and a passionate gardener.
His lifelong interest in gardening was sparked during the war when he was evacuated to the country, initially staying with the head gardener on the grounds of a large country house.
He later won the Royal Horticultural Society’s national cup for vegetables four times in a row and was the chairman of his local gardening club for 27 years and then president until his passing.
Mr Hinton is survived by his wife Susan, his grown-up children Guy, Celia, Matthew and Oliver, 11 grandchildren and one great granddaughter.
He died on August 11. The funeral took place on St Mary’s Church, Shalford on September 11.
