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Just a few weeks weeks since being named a 2017 HousingWire Tech 100 winner, Freddie Mac is showcasing why it’s among the most innovative technology companies in housing. It’s leveraging big data and advanced analytics to build game-changing solutions into Loan Advisor Suite, with new capabilities in Loan Product Advisor its next-generation, automated, underwriting solution.
For Freddie Mac, the future of automated underwriting is now.
“We’re constantly innovating and improving to better meet the needs of our customers,” said Andy Higginbotham, Freddie Mac senior vice president, single-family strategic delivery. “With, Loan Product Advisor, the anchor tool of our award-winning Loan Advisor Suite, we’ve done just that. By building powerful new capabilities, we’ve made our trusted underwriting tool, smarter, simpler and better.“
Better Tool. Better Loans
The new Loan Product Advisor Feedback Certificate helps lenders quickly identify and understand key results. Feedback messages are logically grouped by category (e.g., employment and income), and simple navigation and data visualization make finding specific results fast and easy.
In addition, Loan Product Advisor has a new Asset Information section to help determine a borrower’s closing costs and whether they have sufficient eligible assets. New cash-to-close feedback messages provide more detail about the values provided in this section, and actionable feedback messages provide more loan-specific underwriting direction.
“The focus of this innovation—and all our innovation— is a faster, more efficient loan process, saving lenders money while delivering a better experience for their borrowers. So, if lenders haven’t taken a look in a while, they may be surprised by what they find,” Higginbotham said.
The Feedback Certificate isn’t the only thing that will impress loan officers. In the midst of a tight credit environment, Freddie Mac specifically focused on how to help lenders expand opportunities for the approximately 25 million customers without a traditional credit score.
By automating what had been a manual underwriting process for borrowers without credit scores, Loan Product Advisor can help lenders serve more potential homebuyers more efficiently and with greater certainty.
And in the next few months, Freddie Mac will offer automated collateral evaluation which will waive the need for an appraisal for certain mortgages, and automated borrower income and asset validation services through Loan Product Advisor.
“Eligibility information regarding all the new capabilities we are adding, as well as regarding collateral representation and warranty relief, will be provided in Loan Product Advisor, making for a more seamless experience,” Higginbotham said. “Ultimately, it’s about cutting costs and giving our customers rep and warranty relief sooner in the process.”
Get Closing Confidence
As lenders gear up to meet the Uniform Closing Dataset (UCD) mandate beginning Sept. 25, 2017, Freddie Mac has a solution within its award-winning Suite to help lenders prepare for, meet and maintain alignment with the requirements of the mandate. Loan Closing Advisor is Freddie Mac’s collection solution for the UCD and it helps lenders validate that closing data conforms to the UCD requirements.
But it’s more than just a collection solution.
“Loan Closing Advisor helps drive efficiency by providing actionable feedback on the quality of the lenders’ UCD data files, so errors can be identified and corrections made prior to closing, thereby reducing any likelihood of loan remediation and delivery delays,” Higginbotham said.
Loan Closing Advisor is also available to correspondents so they can validate the UCD XML file structure and data before delivering the loan. Once the loan is delivered, aggregators will be able to see the XML data, correspondents’ validation results and the Closing Disclosure PDF prior to purchase so they can be sure the loans meet the UCD standards.
“Freddie Mac has been working for over a year on integration partnerships with loan origination system vendors, doc prep providers and settlement agents to provide an integrated technology solution to handle the heavy lifting of the XML file creation and automated submission for validation,” Higginbotham said.
Lenders can use one of these partnerships or submit directly to the Loan Closing Advisor customer test environment to begin getting a view of the feedback.
“The way we built Loan Closing Advisor and the enhancements we are making to Loan Product Advisor highlight how we designed Loan Advisor Suite through a lender’s lens.” Higginbotham said. “We are constantly thinking about how we can enhance the Suite to best meet the needs of our customers and provide them with the best experience. It wasn’t designed as a one-and-done, but as a continuously improving set of tools.”
