This week TMC is celebrating National Volunteer Week by spotlighting and recognizing our Director of Member Engagement, Jen Peachman. Jen generously gives her time and resources to a cause very near to her heart. This month she presented a check for $13,222 to the Cystinosis Research Foundation during the non-profit's annual Day of Hope conference.

​Jen's daughter, Morgan, has Cystinosis, a rare genetic metabolic disease that affects approximately only 500 people in the United States. In patients with Cystinosis, the amino acid cystine gets trapped in all of the cells of the body, crystalize and cause early cell death. Over a period of years, cystine slowly destroys various organs in the body, including the kidneys, liver, muscles, and eyes.

​Every year, Jen organizes and hosts Mulligans Fore Morgan, a charity golf tournament in honor of her daughter Morgan, benefiting the Cystinosis Research Foundation, the world's leading fund provider for research to improve treatments and find a cure for Cystinosis. In the past two years alone, her family has donated over $25,000 to this worthwhile cause.

​The 3rd annual Mulligans Fore Morgan golf tournament will be held on Sunday, September 17th in Avon, OH. Visit www.cystinosisresearch.org/mulligans-fore-morgan to donate or register to join Jen and her family for a day of golf to support a great cause. Sponsorships and donations made to the Cystinosis Research Foundation are 100% tax deductible and every penny, every dollar goes directly to research. Questions? Contact Jen at (440) 342-7817.


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David G. Kittle, CMB and president and vice chairman of The Mortgage Collaborative, gave the MBA’s proposal an enthusiastic thumbs-up.

“I believe its chances [of getting approved] are good, if not for all of it, at least part of it,” Kittle told Orb. “It moves the discussion to the proper level.

“The issue of GSE reform is critically important for the independent mortgage banks, community banks and credit unions that today originate more than three out of every four home loans in the country,” Kittle said in an earlier statement. “The MBA’s reform proposal recognizes the value of a competitive and diverse primary market and calls for important reforms that will provide stable liquidity for the 30-year fixed mortgage and preserve a level playing field for smaller lenders.

“Guarantee fees based on loan quality, not volume, and a new structure that encourages increased private capital flow into the primary market are all central elements to the MBA plan and key principles for the members of the Mortgage Collaborative,” he added.

To view the full article on MortgageOrb.com, click here.

The latest edition of America’s Mortgage News presented by Credit Plus reveals how the anticipated reduction of public record information on credit reports may impact credit scores. As part of the National Consumer Assistance Plan, the three bureaus are expected to reduce the amount of tax lien and civil judgment data they report, resulting in a significant information gap. This episode details how this gap could help consumers appear more credit-worthy and make loan-screening more challenging for lenders.

• For more information on Credit Plus and their suite of over 160 products, contact Michael Crockett.
  

SAN DIEGO, Calif., April 25, 2017 (SEND2PRESS NEWSWIRE) — The Mortgage Collaborative, the nation’s only independent mortgage cooperative, today announced a partnership with Blend, a Silicon Valley technology company bringing mortgages into the modern age, to deliver a digital mortgage experience that is fast, simple and secure to its network of small, mid-sized, and community-based lenders.
“Lenders stand to save ample time, energy, and resources when they can offer their customers a truly digital mortgage experience,” said Rich Swerbinsky, EVP of National Sales & Strategic Alliances for The Mortgage Collaborative. “Blend’s platform is well-regarded in the industry, and we look forward to helping place their technology in the hands of more lenders through our network.”
As a result of the partnership, The Mortgage Collaborative’s members will receive discounted pricing on Blend’s white-label platform, which creates an end-to-end digital mortgage experience that simplifies workflows for lenders and borrowers, while reducing risk and ensuring compliance. The Mortgage Collaborative’s network of lenders can offer borrowers a simpler, faster application process using any desktop, tablet, or mobile device.

Furthermore, Blend will provide members of The Mortgage Collaborative with frequent expertise at various network education events hosted throughout the year.
“Blend uses technology and consumer-centered design to provide the most seamless home lending process possible,” said Nima Ghamsari, CEO & co-founder of Blend. “The Mortgage Collaborative has assembled an impressive roster of lenders, and this partnership will help ensure lenders of all shapes and sizes can offer their consumers a truly modern borrowing experience.”
The Mortgage Collaborative network is more than 100 lenders strong, with an annual origination volume of $156 billion. The network caters to lenders of all sizes, with the majority of members generating between $500 million and $2 billion in originations annually.

About Blend:
Blend is a Silicon Valley technology company transforming the multi-trillion dollar home mortgage industry. Blend’s technology delivers speed and efficiency to lenders, so they can serve the modern borrower and safely navigate the industry’s changing rules and regulations.

Founded in May 2012, Blend is backed by Peter Thiel, Andreessen Horowitz, Formation 8, Lightspeed, Max Levchin, Hans Morris, and other leading venture investors. To learn more, visit https://blend.com/.

About The Mortgage Collaborative:
Based in San Diego, The Mortgage Collaborative was founded in 2013 to empower mortgage lenders across the country with better financial execution, reduced costs, enhanced expertise, improved compliance, and to help its members access the dynamic and changing consumer base in America. The association is managed by its founding members: John Robbins, CMB; David Kittle, CMB; Gary Acosta, CEO of the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals (NAHREP); and Jim Park, former chair of the Asian Real Estate Association of America (AREAA). Robbins and Kittle are former chairmen of the Mortgage Bankers Association of America (MBA). For more information, visit: http://www.mortgagecollaborative.com.

The Mortgage Collaborative's network continues to expand with the addition of 6 new preferred partners to our network. We're thrilled to welcome 5X Solutions, Blend, Lender Price, LendingQB, Stewart Lender Services and VidVerify! 

The Mortgage Collaborative is excited to welcome 18 new lender members to our network, all joining TMC in the first quarter of 2017!

• American Equity Mortgage - St. Louis, MO
• Associated Mortgage Bankers - Ronkonkoma, NY
• Cambria Mortgage - Eden Prairie, MN
• Castle & Cooke Mortgage - Draper, UT
• Century Lending Company - Louisville, KY
• CrossCountry Mortgage - Brecksville, OH
• Eustis Mortgage - New Orleans, LA
• First Cal - Petaluma, CA
• First Federal Bank of Kansas City - Kansas City, MO
• Franklin First Financial - Melville, NY
• Huron Valley Financial - Ann Arbor, MI
• Johnson Bank - Racine, WI
• JMAC Lending - Santa Ana, CA
• Michigan Mutual - Port Huron, MI
• Settlers Bank - Windsor, WI
• SIRVA Mortgage - Independence, OH
• State Bank - Definace, OH
• Western Ohio Mortgage - Sidney, OH

​MortgageOrb's Patrick Barnard recently interviewed Linn Cook, Director of Sales & Marketing for LendingQB as their Person of the Week, to learn more about how lenders are making the transition to digital mortgage channels and consumer-direct lending.

Mortgage lenders everywhere are upgrading to e-mortgage capabilities, which means they are moving away from the traditional paper-based processes of the past and converting over to all-digital processes.

That means lenders are increasingly investing in new technologies – for example, many now have online portals through which borrowers can learn about the mortgage process, shop for the best loan, submit an application and, in most cases, learn whether they are pre-approved in just a matter of minutes or hours. Facilitating this “instant” pre-approval process are advanced technologies, including automated underwriting and automated income and asset verification.

Mortgage lenders are investing in these new technologies because they know that today’s younger home buyers want a fast and simple online mortgage experience, regardless of which device they are using.

Q: Online loan programs, such as Quicken Loans’ Rocket Mortgage and BeSmartee, have garnered a lot of attention for moving loans from application to underwriting in a matter of hours. Why are these programs resonating with lenders – and how receptive have consumers been to them?

Cook: For lenders, the key to profitability and market share is being able to minimize the time from when a borrower expresses interest in a loan to locking the customer in with an approval and offer. Digital mortgage channels such as Quicken’s Rocket Mortgage and BeSmartee represent the transformation in mortgage we are witnessing. With these channels, lenders have the opportunity to meet borrowers where they are located – meaning, a customer can sit in a Realtor’s office or wait for a brew at his or her coffee shop and apply for a loan rather than sit at a desktop at home after the excitement of the property has waned. The idea is to allow lenders to become omnipresent, in a way, while providing services consumers expect 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Q: Once a borrower applies for a loan via a consumer-direct point-of-sale (POS), how do the POS software and the loan origination system (LOS) work together to expedite the processing, underwriting and verification process?

Cook: The POS and LOS work together to expedite the processing, underwriting and verification through the automation of data. With Fannie Mae’s Day 1 Certainty program driving incentive at the investor level, lenders are able to eliminate a significant amount of manual processes using automated data verification services, allowing underwriting decisions to be made much faster and with greater reliability.

By enabling data verification services to be initiated and completed by the borrower on his or her own, the POS transfers efficiency directly into the LOS by way of tight integration with these verification services.

Q: What should lenders look for when building an online consumer-direct loan channel?

Cook: Lenders must be sure that the integrity of the data flowing between the POS and the LOS is airtight. There cannot be any discrepancy in the loan application, data verification, loan pricing, and especially, closing cost fees between the POS and the LOS, or a lender is going to be in a whole lot of compliance pain.

Closing costs are, by far, the most finicky and troublesome aspect of data integrity, so lenders need to pay more attention in this area. The other aspect of consumer-direct lending is maintaining a focus on borrower and loan officer expectations. They are the primary consumers of POS systems – and their feedback is essential to the success of any consumer-direct or digital lending effort.

Q: What is LendingQB doing to help lenders implement consumer-direct lending?

​Cook: LendingQB’s API model provides lenders with the flexibility to select the POS solution that works best for them. That is the notion behind our best-of-breed approach. We’re not in a position to tell lenders what POS solution to use because the consumer-direct business proposition is still unproven. No one has it figured out yet.
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In our view, the most prudent thing to do is give our lenders the opportunity to be creative and try what works best for them right now. It may be one of the vendors we have integrated with, it may be building one completely from scratch, or it may be something that hasn’t even been invented yet. Our role as the LOS platform provider is to provide technology that makes it easier and less expensive for lenders to carry out their POS strategy. An open architecture API provides fertile ground for lenders to be as innovative as they want to be.

• To learn more about LendingQB, contact Linn Cook.

TROY, Mich., April 06, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Dart Appraisal, a leading nationwide, independent appraisal management company (AMC), today announced it will offer a new valuation product to its lender clients through a collaboration with HouseCanary, the leading real estate data analytics company based in San Francisco. The Value Report provides an on-demand valuation, risk assessment and market data for a single property or entire portfolios.

The collaboration is a strategic move at a time when mortgage lenders are demanding more accurate, streamlined valuation products. To maintain its leadership position, Dart Appraisal is innovating on residential valuations and appraisals, teaming up with HouseCanary, a Silicon Valley company pioneering the use of big data analytics to accurately value America’s more than 100 million residential properties.

“At Dart Appraisal, we're always striving to offer the most unique and efficient products that meet our partners' needs,” said Michael Dresden, president of Dart Appraisal. “The Value Report is a modern option for lenders who want to value their portfolio, or who need a quick valuation on a property that provides more detail than a standard Automated Valuation Model.”

The Value Report delivers comprehensive property details, including its sales history and a suitability score, ranking the subject property against its 10 closest, algorithmically selected comparables. Lenders will also receive an understanding of the local market, as well as a three-year value forecast for both the subject property and the market environment.

“HouseCanary measures price movements on every residential block in the country, allowing for precise home valuations,” said Jeremy Sicklick, HouseCanary CEO. “Our algorithms combine 40 years of history, 1 billion residential transactions and hundreds of proprietary calculations influencing home values, providing lenders a modern way to accelerate loan origination and underwriting. We’re excited to work with Dart Appraisal to meet the new demand.”

Dart Appraisal.com is an independently-owned, nationwide Appraisal Management Company (AMC) founded in 1993. For more than two decades, the company has built a reputation of superior customer service combined with innovative technology to deliver accurate and timely residential appraisals. Thousands of orders are tracked in real time using a proprietary order management platform designed and maintained by Dart Appraisal. With a singular focus on appraisal management, Dart Appraisal has developed a direct relationship with both appraisers and clients. The company manages a nationwide appraiser panel that requires appraisers to meet stringent quality standards to ensure local competence and reliable appraisals. www.dartappraisal.com.

• For more information on Dart Appraisal, contact Michael Dresden & Marc Tatarcuk.

Congratulations to Sterling National Bank, who ranked 5th nationally among Best Performing Regional Banks & Publicly Traded Regional Banks!

S&P Global Market Intelligence ranked the best-performing regional banks using six core financial metrics that focus on profitability, asset quality, and loan growth for the year ended Dec. 31, 2016. The metrics included return on average tangible common equity, net charge-offs as a percentage of average loans, adjusted Texas ratio, efficiency ratio, net interest margin and loan growth.

​For each of the six metrics, S&P Global Market Intelligence measured each company's standard deviation from the mean of all eligible companies. The standard deviations were given equal weights and then added together to calculate a performance score the each company. Caps and floors were also implemented to prevent significant outliers from skewing a company's rank.

​For the purposes of this ranking, S&P Global Market Intelligence defined regional banks as those top-tier consolidated banks and thrifts with total assets between $10 to $50 billion. S&P Global Market Intelligence chose the $50 billion asset cutoff to separate smaller regional banks from larger superregionals that may be subject to greater regulatory scrutiny, including Comprehensive Capital Analysis and Review.