A new mortgage lender is launching in Colorado this week, promising to bring “ethical” mortgages to borrowers looking to buy high-priced real estate.
Eave, which bills itself as a “revolutionary” lender, is launching in Colorado and offering jumbo mortgages to homebuyers in the state.
According to the company, it chose Colorado to launch because of the state’s “resilience in recessions and because it is one of the most competitive markets in the country.”
Eave was founded by three tech-and-finance veterans: former Capital One executive Saro Vasudevan, Jack McCambridge, a former executive at Hailo, and Anoop Ranganath, a former manager at Foursquare.
According to the company, its backers include Bessemer Venture Partners, Two Sigma Ventures, and “sophisticated banks.”
Eave claims that it has “re-envisioned the whole mortgage experience,” and can provide a full and complete underwriting and close a borrower’s loan within 21 days.
The company lends to buyers of homes valued between $665,000 and $8 million.
According to the company, it lends the money to borrowers itself and then “transfers” the loans to “prominent regional banks.”
The company also claims that its engineers automate 60% of the mortgage process in its software, which is operated by expert underwriters to underwrite a borrower fast and safe.
Here’s how the company explains its underwriting process on its website:
Our software tailors the application process to you. We ask only for info we actually need, whereas more than 60% of the information collected by other lenders isn't important to making a solid underwriting decision.
“So,” you're saying, “that's the catch! You're one of those ‘no doc’ shops from The Big Short.”
Nope, that's not it either! We collect more information than other lenders, and we get it from better sources faster. But we don't ask you for 200+ pages of paper documents, and we're smart enough to know that a missing signature on pages 47 and 58 of your bank statements isn't material.
The company also claims that it is creating “ethical” mortgages. “An ethical mortgage is transparent, cost-effective, and in your best interest,” the company says on its website. “We’ve built the lender we’d want to work with when buying our dream homes.”
The company does not provide any detail on what exactly it means by "ethical mortgages" beyond claiming to be responsibly underwritten. Perhaps it's a signal that Eave's mortgages are not like the mortgages of the crisis-era or even other jumbo loans that are currently being originated.
On the other hand, the company claims that it helps create a “safe” home in India each time it closes a loan. According to the company, Eave donates $500-$750 per home to a company called Milaap, an Indian crowdfunding platform for personal and social causes, so “families can create the homes they need.”
The company has offices in Denver, along with California and New York, although the company makes no mention of expanding beyond Colorado at this time.
