COVID-19 related issues facing the mortgage market have really highlighted the benefits attached to integrating the right tech solutions.
Neal Jannels is managing director of One Mortgage System (OMS)
As a tech provider, it’s important for us to not only be fully aware of tech advances which could directly impact the functionality, efficiency and delivery of our product but also focus on what kind of other tools are available in and around the mortgage market.
Something that recently caught my eye recently was a news story on the Mortgage Introducer website from online portfolio management platform Lendlord and the launch of its Portfolio Evaluation module. The aim of which is to help landlords and property investors to instantly analyse the projected future performance of their existing properties, and of their entire portfolio. This is also said to provide key metrics including predicted net cash flow; cash on cash; cap rate; internal rate of return (IRR); and long-term return on investment (ROI).
Online tools incorporating these types of intuitive features not only apply to landlords or investors when managing their portfolios, but also for intermediary firms when it comes to managing their wider business needs. Market conditions dictate that all forms of business are benefiting from sophisticated insights, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to help them constantly evaluate business models, streamline internal procedures and maximise data.
When it comes to maximising data, it’s fair to say that the mortgage market has a long history of - at best - not utilising this optimally and - at worst - totally ignoring it. In fairness, many lenders, distributors, service providers and intermediary firms have greatly improved the way that they collate, manage and utilise data in recent times. However, on many end of term report cards, the infamous phrase ‘could do better’ would still be visible far more than it should.
Focusing on AI and machine learning, there has been some sustained naivety in terms of the impact this type of tech is having, and will continue to have, throughout the mortgage market. There are also some lingering misconceptions that AI is only applicable for businesses which are operating within the B2C marketplace. This is certainly not the case. Firms working within the B2C and B2B space should constantly be investigating ways to utilise the many cost-effective benefits attached to AI in order to help them simplify front and back-end processes, enhance time- management practices, complete audit trails and solidify compliance measures.
Recent Covid-19 related issues facing the mortgage market have really highlighted the benefits attached to integrating the right tech solutions and, here at OMS, we have been fortunate enough to see demand for our system dramatically increase over this period. As such we recently extended our support and development teams to accommodate this growth. And herein lies another important lesson. In a similar vein to how technology learns from us, we can learn from technology and how this is integrated across other businesses and sectors. But we also have to remember that investment in the people who are developing and operating this technology remains just as important.
