Every vendor here at the MBA conference suggests they can help clients close more loans faster, more efficiently and compliantly. If only all these lenders had more loans in their pipelines to close! But lenders here in NY are an optimistic bunch.

Lender Products

Yesterday at the MBA Secondary conference in New York, Mortgage Coach and Optimal Blue announced an enhanced integration that avails access to accurate pricing within the Mortgage Coach platform. Now every Mortgage Coach-powered loan originator can include real-time product and pricing data within the Total Cost Analysis – in seconds without ever leaving the Mortgage Coach app – giving their borrowers the transparent and accurate loan options they need to make a confident mortgage decision faster. “Combining the sophisticated product and pricing data at the heart of every mortgage transaction with a compelling user experience — and doing so whenever, wherever it matters most — is a game changer for the industry.” explained Bob Brandt, Vice President of Marketing & Strategic Alliances for Optimal Blue. Executives interested in learning exactly how to increase production with this new integration can contact Jim Wrigley.

Get alerted when a customer is shopping for a mortgage right on your mobile device! Advantage Credit, Inc., a leading provider of credit reporting services and the developer of Monitoring Advantage which is the premier client retention and lead generation tool has announced an integration partnership with SimpleNexus. SimpleNexus is an enterprise digital mortgage platform enabling lenders to originate and process loans from anywhere and now to automatically receive notifications to their smartphone of immediate prospect opportunities. This integration with Monitoring Advantage and SimpleNexus may be used whether the client is a credit customer of Advantage Credit, or any other CRA. For more information, please contact the Advantage Credit sales team at sales@advcredit.com.

Caliber Home Loans, Inc. announces its partnership with Ellie Mae, the leading cloud-based platform provider for the mortgage industry. Caliber will leverage Ellie Mae’s delivery solution – Encompass Investor Connect – to bring its correspondent lending partners the benefits of a true digital mortgage experience. Encompass Investor Connect’s solution supports the needs of lenders and investors, by removing the manual loan package delivery process and delivering it directly from Ellie Mae’s Loan Origination System to the investor. The solution provides one centralized system of record that results in improved purchase times, while enhancing accuracy and compliance. “Caliber’s pleased to partner with Ellie Mae on this initiative because of the efficiencies it brings to the market,” said Patricia Shumate, Caliber EVP of Correspondent Lending.” It’ll increase the accuracy of data transfer, decrease turn times and reduce the costs associated with the sale and purchase of closed loans. Ultimately, this will result in a better experience for the borrower.”

The “1003” should be called the “1030” because it's missing at least 27 very important pieces of information at a minimum. PerfectLO completes the 1003 and asks the other 27-100 questions. We all know that a completed "1003" is quite useless even when completed. The real pain in your operation begins and ends with a perfect loan interview and thorough doc checklist. So why wouldn't you have your borrowers click on your link and answer ALL the questions that you need the first time? And why not add a solution that builds a perfect Doc Checklist? That’s just what PerfectLO does. Sign up for a free trial and demo PerfectLO’s online questionnaire takes a logical and systematic approach while creating a dynamic document checklist based off their answers. PerfectLO is a multi-language, mobile friendly, cloud-based, white-labeled, software solution that talks to all LOSs.

More Technology and Vendor Updates

Vendors are a clever bunch, individually. Unfortunately, many lenders I spoke to here at the conference are confused about which vendor does exactly what, who is partnered with who, how expensive they are, and so on. Let’s take a random sample of who is doing what in the vendor arena, some new products some less recent.

Recently Digital Risk LLC, an Mphasis company, a leading End to End Origination, risk, compliance, and technology services company providing differentiated solutions to the mortgage, consumer lending, and other regulated industries, announced CitiMortgage as a marquee client for its digital mortgage platform, LoanFx. “LoanFx, designed for self-service, will be integrated in all of CitiMortgage’s digital channels, including mobile and tablet interfaces. Citi clients will now benefit by becoming verifiers, instead of suppliers of information. LoanFx will also provide real-time updates throughout the process to Citi loan officers, their clients, and their realtors for increased transparency.”

Tavant, a digital products and solutions company for the consumer lending industry, is collaborating with Freddie Mac to launch a one-click submission of loan data to Loan Product Advisor®, providing lenders a means to improve loan functionality and best execution without sacrificing operational efficiency. This solution uses machine learning and process automation techniques to submit loan-data via a single click to both Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, enabling lenders to see the full view of options available to their borrowers and ultimately leading to an improved borrower experience. Tavant will begin piloting this solution with four selected lenders leveraging the partnership to achieve best execution goals.

Ephesoft Inc., rolled out its Ephesoft Transact for Mortgage. This marks the first time Ephesoft will offer a vertical-specific product and the first SaaS cloud solution for mortgage processing. To process a mortgage loan, more than 600 different document types need to be classified, which makes this industry ideally suited for document capture innovation. This product can be implemented into loan origination systems in a matter of days to dramatically improve speed and accuracy to process loans quicker.

DocMagic’s eMortgage services, announced that Deutsche Bank has successfully implemented and is actively utilizing its proprietary eVault technology. Deutsche Bank’s document custody group is now empowered to take full possession of electronically originated assets for clients as the loan market continues to transition to a paperless process. DocMagic establishes a legally compliant method to securely move original electronic files from one custodian to another, while preserving unique authoritative digital ownership.

ACES Risk Management (ARMCO), the leading provider of financial risk mitigation and compliance solutions, announced that it has launched The Compliance NewsHub, the mortgage industry’s first free comprehensive searchable online resource for regulation-related news and information. The Compliance NewsHub provides mortgage lenders with fast and easy access to the most comprehensive source of current information on a full range of regulation-related topics—from investor guidelines to state law and CFPB mandates. ARMCO’s Compliance NewsHub provides the latest compliance news and announcements, categorized according to the following segments: federal legislation, legal, industry, agency/GSE and state. Visitors can also sign up to receive The Compliance NewsHub Bulletin to stay informed with news alerts.

Quovo, a data platform that provides connectivity to consumer financial accounts, announced two new products to streamline processes across the mortgage lending value chain. The new products include Income + Expense, a tool that analyzes and summarizes income and expense streams, and Balance Estimator, a tool to predict future account balances up to 30 days in advance based on historical cash flows.

Factual Data, providers of credit and validation services to the mortgage lending industry, is teaming with MortgageHippo to provide a modern approach to the digital mortgage process.

The integration of consumer credit reports from Factual Data with MortgageHippo’s customizable point-of-sale digital lending solution will allow loan officers and lenders to maximize time and efficiency by receiving industry-proven credit data within the borrower profile generated from MortgageHippo’s mobile-ready online application.

Approved, a digital mortgage platform for independent lenders and brokers, has partnered with LendingQB, a provider of SaaS loan origination technology solutions, to launch its digital mortgage experience and wholesale submission platform for lenders and their broker networks. The Approved platform is available now. With this integration, leads through to submissions can all take place through the same point of sale a broker is using to manage their borrowers and process loan packages.

Blend announced the launch of Blend Marketplace with two of its upcoming partners, LendingTree and Total Expert, later this year. Blend Marketplace will serve as a hub for ecosystem partners to build on Blend, generate new business, and work together to reimagine lending from end to end. For lenders, this means lower costs, greater transparency, and a more sustainable industry. “We partnered with Blend to take advantage of their speed and infrastructure,” said Joe Welu, founder and CEO of Total Expert. “We knew it made sense for us to work with a leading technology company that builds a digital lending platform that aligns with our focus on bringing the most modern technology to lenders across the country.”

Matic, a digital insurance agency whose technology enables borrowers to purchase homeowner’s insurance during the mortgage transaction announced an integration with mortgage lender RoundPoint that includes Matic’s one-click “get quote” button. Homeowners whose mortgages are serviced by RoundPoint will be notified by Matic when they could save money by switching to a different A-rated homeowner’s insurance carrier. Homeowners will also be alerted if there’s an opportunity to get more coverage without an increase in premium.

Regulatory Relief Bill – Why Should LOs Care?

Yes, underwriting, compliance, and regulation are in flux. Yesterday the House passed the regulatory relief bill (S.2155) by a vote of 258 to 159. It includes a ratcheting upward of the $50 billion bank asset threshold to $250 billion within 18 months, a capital simplification off-ramp for banks with less than $10 billion in assets, the QM portfolio lending proposal, and another increase to the Small Bank Holding Company Policy Statement. The bill will now head to the president for his signature, which is expected as early as this week. Lenders and banks are interested in the help it gives M&A deals, loan officers are particularly interested in the QM changes.

The bill will provide Qualified Mortgage designation for most mortgages held in portfolio by banks with less than $10 billion in assets. It raises the threshold for designation as a systemically important financial institution from $50 billion in assets and will apply principles of tailored supervision to larger banks. It ends mandated stress tests for banks with under $100 billion in assets and will simplify capital calculations for community banks. Look for relief from appraisal requirements for smaller mortgages, longer exam cycles for community banks, charter flexibility for federal thrifts with less than $20 billion in assets, and relief from the Volcker Rule for most community banks.

Lenders should also know it has SAFE Act amendments to provide 120 days of transitional authority for MLOs to originate when leaving a depository to join a sponsoring non-bank (or when crossing state lines). It will apply TILA consumer protections to PACE/energy efficiency mortgage products. The Bill has modest relief for certain small lenders from HMDA (500 loans per year), and language to address problems with TRID which will eliminate CD re-disclosure when rates go down and direct the BCFP to provide written guidance in other areas of confusion and uncertainty. It has added safeguards to protect veterans, surviving spouses and service members who utilize the VA Home Loan program’s IRRRL refinancing product, offers an improved, more workable regulatory regime for the eligibility of High Volatility Commercial Real Estate (HVCRE) construction loans, and has partial TRID and HMDA relief. Thus FHA & VA prices were helped since there are further changes to the VA Housing Loan Program which should limit churning and other improprieties.

Capital Markets

In terms of yesterday’s bond market price movement and therefore interest rates, it was a snoozer – rates haven’t changed much all week. There wasn’t any news of substance in the U.S., and overseas attention was focused on China which said it will cut tariffs for autos and auto parts. Ginnie Mae security prices were helped by S. 2155 passing which includes further changes to the VA Housing Loan Program which should limit churning. Both the 5-year and 10-year notes closed unchanged (the 10-year yielding 3.06%).

This morning we’ve seen last week’s application data from the MBA (-2.6%, refis are now 36% of apps and are the lowest they’ve been since 2000). Coming up are New Home Sales, the U.S. Treasury selling $16 billion of 2-year notes and $36 billion of 5-year notes, and the release of the minutes of the May 1/ 2 FOMC meeting. In the very early going the 10-year yield is down to 3.01% so look for some improvement in MBS prices.

Employment

In MI job news, “Are you looking to join an organization with great history, culture, and opportunity? If so, MGIC, a founder of the private mortgage insurance industry, has a great opportunity for an ambitious sales professional to cover the State of Alabama, as well as the Florida Panhandle. Customer base includes Mortgage Bankers, Banks, Credit Unions, etc. As an Account Manager, you will develop and maintain strong, long lasting client relationships as well as grow business by identifying new business opportunities. The ideal candidate must have strong presentation and communication skills, and the ability to occasionally travel overnight. This person will report directly to Steve Cox, Sales Manager. If you are interested in joining a company with 60 years of industry leadership and legacy, please send your resume to Nancy Vang-Lee, Senior Talent Acquisition Partner.