Become a Member
Find a Member
California MBA California MBA
  • About
    • About Us
    • Who We Are
    • CAMPAC
    • Contact Us
  • Events
  • Membership
    • About Membership
    • Advocacy
    • Education
      • Connect Podcast
      • Future Leaders Program
    • Committees
      • Conference Committees
      • Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Committee
      • Legal Issues Committee
      • Legislative Committee
      • Membership Committee
      • Mortgage Innovation Committee
      • MQAC Committee
  • Blog
  • Career
  • My Account
Find a Member
Become a Member
California MBA

software

Home / software
20May

3 Ways for Lenders to Boost Efficiency in Appraisal Operations

May 20, 2022 California MBA Residential

As the mortgage industry shifts more of its traditional workflows to digital operations – such as with eSigning, eNotes, eVaults, and more – the appraisal process cannot be an afterthought. There are numerous inefficiencies associated with the “old world” of appraisals that are slowing mortgage lenders’ turn times, keeping production costs high, and negatively impacting the borrower’s experience – all of which ultimately affect the bottom line.

This guide highlights three key areas where efficiency gains have been proven to generate measurable ROI: appraisal ordering and vendor allocation, appraisal payments, and communication and visibility. These lender-appraiser touchpoints are riddled with manual, error-prone tasks that are better executed by technology. Automation will not only expand employee bandwidth, but it will also do the work faster, more effectively and with greater accuracy.

Click above to open and download the guide ^^ (there’s no form!)

By focusing on modernizing operations in the three aforementioned areas, lenders have reported increasing efficiency by 213% and reducing their appraisal desk staff by 75%, among other quantifiable benefits.

Want to achieve similar results? Download this free guide to better understand where inefficiencies exist in your appraisal operations and the steps your organization can take to improve its appraisal-related processes and maximize impact.

If you would like to learn more about how Reggora can help, reach out to schedule a conversation with our team.

Learn More About Reggora
Read more
20May

5 Things to Know About Desktop Appraisals

May 20, 2022 California MBA Residential

Beginning in March 2022, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will begin to accept desktop appraisals. This means that a licensed appraiser will be allowed to complete the home appraisal without physically visiting the property. Instead, they will leverage data that can be made available to via third parties (homeowner, realtor, builder, etc.) and through public sources.

While desktop appraisals should enable faster (and potentially cheaper) approaches compared to the traditional appraisal, there are many caveats that lenders and appraisers should be aware of.

Fannie Mae: About Desktop Appraisals
Fannie Mae: About Desktop Appraisals

This guide from Fannie Mae provides initial details and guidelines for how desktop appraisals will work. There’s quite a bit to unpack here, as well as a few things that we’re awaiting clarity on, but we’ve summarized the key takeaways below, and in this LinkedIn video from our CEO. To dive even further into the topic, be sure to register for our upcoming webinar with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac on desktop appraisals.

Here are 5 things lenders and appraisers should know: 

1. Eligibility

Not all loans are eligible for desktop appraisals. The loan must be for a purchase transaction, one-unit principal residence, where the loan-to-value (LTV) ratio is less than or equal to 90%. On top of this, the loan file must also be approved by Fannie Mae’s Desktop Underwriter (DU).

2. Floor plans 

A floor plan with interior walls is required. These floorplans typically don’t exist out in the wild, so an onsite inspection will often still need to occur. This inspection might be able to be done by someone other than an appraiser, such as the homeowner, realtor, builder, etc.,

NOTE: These floor plans and measurements may need to abide by ANSI standards starting April 1, 2022. This is something that we are awaiting further clarification on.

3. Appraiser discretion 

The appraiser must have sufficient information to develop a credible report. The appraiser has the discretion to reject the order if they don’t feel comfortable with the data available to them. This means that getting high quality data to the appraiser for the floor plan and other property characteristics will be very important.

4. Verification

Any data (including potentially the floor plans mentioned above) that is provided by third parties with a financial interest in the sale or financing of the property (homeowner, realtor, builder, etc.) MUST be verified by a disinterested source. This could include maps, assessor data, or virtual inspection technologies. It will be important to accomodate any validation and verification processes that will be required by the appraiser, the lender, or both,

5. It’s optional 

When permissible, ordering a desktop appraisal is optional for the lender. The lender or borrower always has the option to request that a traditional appraisal is obtained, regardless if a desktop or some other form of appraisal relief is offered.

As this initiative moves forward, it will be of interest to see the frequency of eligibility for desktop appraisals, and, when eligibility is offered, how often requests for desktop appraisal are actually fulfilled. Either way, this is important progress in the industry that will pave the way for further modernization and alternative products. For more insight on desktop appraisals, view our March 2022 webinar with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac on the subject.

How can Reggora help? Our goal is to make it easy for lenders and appraisers to adopt desktop appraisals, and we’re currently working closely with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and our appraiser and AMC partners to understand the nuances and provide guidance to the industry. If you have questions about leveraging desktop appraisals and what you should do to prepare, please contact your Reggora customer success team or reach out to our sales team here.

Learn More About Reggora
Read more
12Nov

What Data Insights Do Mortgage Lenders Need Right Now?

November 12, 2020 LBA Ware Residential

The novel coronavirus outbreak has tested lenders’ ability to adapt to sudden, monumental change. Branch managers are grappling with an influx of record-high refi volume and lack of staff capacity all while transitioning to a remote business model. Instant data insights and concise communication are now more important than ever to keep employees connected, on track, and of course, motivated.

To absorb as much refi business as possible while keeping consumers happy, branch managers will need to go “back to basics” in their evaluation of operations and production data.

Here are three real-time data analytics branch managers can use to keep themselves out of the weeds and ensure the entire branch is on the same page.

1. Pull-Through and Fallout

Pull-through and fallout data are essential to helping branch managers identify where they are losing business, why it’s happening and what steps they can take to prevent future losses. Take, for instance, a common lender predicament in our current market: volume is high, but fallout has increased. A branch manager who’s satisfied to simply attribute unusually high fallout to an increased rate shopping market and wash their hands of it could be losing a large swath of good loans.

Read more
Read more
04Aug

Cloud Coverage: Its Always Sunny in the Cloud – Common Myths (Part 2)

August 4, 2020 LoanLogics Residential
David Gitlin, Director of Technology, LoanLogics

I’m back with my second post myth busting common beliefs about the cloud. Part 1 discussed myths surrounding deployment and cost .  Today’s post focuses on our final three cloud myths surrounding security, development and scalability.

3. Myth: The Cloud is less secure then traditional hosting Or Cloud providers will be responsible for all aspects of data security
All these points are simply false. Large cloud companies such as Amazon and Microsoft have huge financial resources at their disposable, and can, and do hire the best security experts in the world. Experts that are available 24×7. Few companies or hosting services can afford this level of staffing. The size of the major cloud providers and the resources available to them also enable them partner with third party best of breed security providers. Also, cloud services are built with security baked in rather then bolted on afterwards. Further the cloud is capable of offering cloud native solutions for identity verification and user Sign-Up, Sign-In, and resource Access Control. AWS Cognito is one example of a cloud-native strategy for managing user verification and access rights. The cloud also provides mechanism to automate security tasks not generally available in other environments.

It is true that organizations are still responsible for locking down their own software. And failure to pay attention to security best practices when building or managing security can lead to security issues. Building cloud native software is not a panacea for not following security best practices. Development and DevOps teams are still responsible for securing their code, data access and ensuring that best practices are followed concerning managing users.

4. Myth: Cloud software development is just like development in standard hosting environments or there is nothing special to learn about software development for the cloud
No and No again! As stated above the cloud can be used like an old-fashioned hosting service in the same way you can ignore object-oriented principles and write a procedural application with an object-oriented language. You can, but what purpose would this serve? The impact of cloud computing on application development is itself a complex topic deserving of its own blog entry. The cloud offers unique services that are transformational and highly impactful on how software is developed, deployed, and used. Cloud native software that fully integrates these services is not the same as software developed for other traditional environments. In future blog entries we will explore the impact of the cloud on how software development is performed.

Read more
Read more

2023 President’s Council

AmeriHome-Mortgage-WAB
Arch-MI-Logo-RGB
Consolidated Analytics, Inc
FundingShield crop
GuildMortgage
InsellerateLogo-UpdatedColor
L-Rocket-CMYK-Vert-P1126591
WA_NewLogo@2x

Learn More

CMBA_white_300x75@2x
(916) 446-7100
info@cmba.com

Office Hours

Mon-Fri

9:00 A.M. – 5:00 P.M.

Sat-Sun

Closed

Corporate Office

3005 Douglas Blvd., Suite 108

Roseville, CA  95661

© 2023 California Mortgage Bankers Association

Privacy Policy | Terms Of Use | CAMPAC Donation