The development of mortgage technology has been put into high gear as a result of the pandemic’s effects on everyday life. As more and more people switch to online mortgage platforms as a result of pandemic rules, mortgage titans are giving their all to develop better online mortgage origination services. The mortgage industry as a whole is at a digital transformation crossroads-either adapt to modern times and continue to exist or don’t and fade away. Let’s take a look at the top 10 trends in mortgage technology in 2020.
Virtual Home Showings
For some time now, many realtors conduct part of if not the entire house viewing experience through video-conferencing tools. No longer do people have to travel hours away to view a house you may want to buy-you can just schedule a virtual house showing with the realtor through a video-conferencing application. Although incorporation of virtual house showings may take a bit longer to implement on the mortgage market scene, it’s not that far off.
Online Live Chat and Texts
Loan officers and lenders also have another technological trick up their sleeves in addition to virtual conferencing tools. More and more lenders as well a loan officers are using online live chat and text messaging to connect with clients and provide their services on demand. Not every customer wants to reveal their email or phone number to a loan officer or lender to get mortgage loan advice, so this is a nice alternative.
The Completely Digital Mortgage
The mortgage industry is not that far off from a complete digital mortgage. If you can get a car loan online and manage your investments online, why not deal with your mortgage online too?
A well-thought out digital mortgage system can remove a lot of the hassle typically associated with the mortgage process. Not to mention, some technological developments relating to open banking can make the digital mortgage application process go a lot faster as well as help customers save money.
Home Buying Services Integration
As technology progresses more and more, customers want a cohesive mortgage buying experience. A comprehensive mortgage buying platform allows customers to have a one-stop shop for all their mortgage needs. By growing vertically instead of horizontally and expanding the services they provide, online mortgage platforms will potentially have higher customer satisfaction and profits.
Modern Marketing for Mortgages
As the rest of the world goes digital, the mortgage industry needs to catch up and utilize marketing practices built for the modern era (Email, Facebook ads, Google Ads, etc). Unfortunately, a lot of lenders and loan officers are using them with an old-school mortgage advertising mindset. By targeting ads, mortgage companies can connect with more of their ideal mortgage customers than ever before. Just be careful when using ad targeting, because you can open yourself up to a lot of discrimination lawsuits if you aren’t careful.
Make your Mortgage Business Virtual
By having your mortgage business go completely virtual, you won’t need to deal with all the costs associated with having a physical office space-no more rent and utilities bills for the office. This way your mortgage company can operate with bigger profit margins as well as a more scalable model since you aren’t weighed down with a physical space.
Expand your Customer Base
Many lending programs currently do not accept a significant number of people that have non-traditional jobs or working environments. That in and of itself is a massive potential customer base just waiting to be tapped into. Whichever mortgage companies develop loan programs that people with non-traditional working environments use first will be rolling in money.
Develop new models for underwriting
Many of younger generations have a vastly different profile from their peers. These younger generations are not a fan of using credit, have a massive problem with student loans, and may potentially use alternative credit options. This means that there is a wide untapped market of customers that may not have a rental history besides a few hundred hotel receipts. By creating new underwriting models to account for this, mortgage companies can gain access to an entirely new sector of customers.
Follow-Up Automation
Follow-up is more crucial than ever in the digital age-especially when customers can see many options from different mortgage lenders in just minutes. To make sure you keep getting customers, it may be beneficial to use services such as email autoresponders, text marketing, and call reminders to hook potential new mortgage customers.
Digital Assistant Search Optimization
People are looking for mortgage services using digital assistants that many in the mortgage industry may not be aware of. More people are searching for mortgage services on their mobile devices, as well as using their voice to have digital assistants find mortgage services for them. This is a potentially massive lost opportunity for mortgage companies that do not optimize their websites for the digital assistant mortgage search.
This article was written by Ian, an intern at Irish Mortgage Brokers and Yes.ie from the USA.
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Mortgage Technology Trends That Can Make Or Break Your Business