TMC Benchmark May Data: Closings up 5% Over April, New Applications Flat

The "spring buying season" continued to slug on for The Mortgage Collaborative's national network of best-in-class mortgage lending institution members that submit data to TMC Benchmark. Closed loan units increased by 2% in May compared to the previous month. Within that, lenders saw closed purchase loans increase by 17% but refinances fell by another 22% month over month to their lowest levels in the six-year history of TMC Benchmark. Refinances fell to an all-time low of 16% of all closings in May.
  
Here's the refinance share we've seen in TMC Benchmark over the last six months:
  
December 2021: 34%
January 2022: 39%
February 2022: 37%
March 2022: 29%
April 2022: 24%
May 2022: 16%
  
The % of conventional closings stayed steady in May at 69% (units). Historically, conventional loans have represented 75-76% of all closed loan units these past six years. On the flip side, government loan closings came in at an all-time high (by share) of 24% this month.
  
After falling 23% month-over-month in April, new applications were reduced by 3% in May from the previous month. The product mix of new applications also stayed consistent, mirroring the aforementioned percentage breakdowns of closed loan units we saw this month.
  
In May, operational efficiency waned slightly, staying pretty flat. The number of closed loan units closed per full-time processor remained steady at 8.2, and closed loan units per full-time closer decreased from 28.2 to 27.2. Closed loan units per full-time underwriter decreased from 24.4 to 23.6 in April. The average loan originator closed 4.3 units in May, the exact same as April. LO comp came in at an average of 86.7 bps, down 1.7 bps from last month's 88.4 total.
  
Average annual compensation paid to operational staff was very flat month-over-month, with average annual comp paid to FTE processors rising slightly to $51,800 this month. Underwriter annual comp ticked up slightly to $88,000. Average annual comp paid to closers remained at $54,000.
  
The average "app date to clear to close date" increased significantly to 42.3 this month as lenders dealt with staff attrition and pipelines of almost nothing but purchase transactions. Let's look at how this number trended throughout 2021 and now into 2022:
  
January '21 - 47.9
February '21 - 43.1
March '21 - 42.8
April '21 - 45.7
May '21 - 43.8
June '21 - 41.8 
July '21 - 43.2
August '21 - 42.5
September '21 - 42.3
October '21 - 42.6
November '21 - 41.0
December '21 - 34.0
January '22 - 40.1
February '22 - 39.6
March '22 - 39.6
April '22 - 39.6
May '22 – 42.3
  
The average cost per closed loan unit our members paid for their loan origination system (LOS) rose slightly yet again in May to $135 from $131 the previous month. The average cost per closed loan unit for our members' point-of-sale (POS) system was down $2 to $60 in May and reduced by $1 at $88 for their CRM.
  
Average non-third-party lender fees continue to trend upward on conventional loans, shooting up to $1,573 in May from $1,148 the previous month. Government lender fees rose from $1,108 to $1,217 in this most recent month.
  
54% of this month's participants in TMC Benchmark were depositories, and 46% were IMBs. 37% originate under $500M a year in annual volume, 27% originate between $500M-$1B, and 36% originate over $1 billion per year in annual production.
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Rich Swerbinsky
President & COO, The Mortgage Collaborative
[email protected]