Over the last four years, people have dreamed of digitizing the mortgage process. As more online loan origination fintech disruptors have emerged over the last year, the mortgage industry has been put on notice, and their effect on the market is obvious.
At Mortech, we live by a set of core values, one of which is “Move Fast, Think Big”. Over the last year, my peers at Mortech and I have been working with some of the brightest minds in the industry that are moving fast and thinking big, by creating a better user experience for borrowers.
Lenders and vendors alike are working to create the most automated, streamlined borrower application by tying together industry APIs, including Mortech’s industry leading pricing and eligibility APIs. One of Mortech’s biggest users of XML is Sindeo. Sindeo has created the SindeoOne app, which allows borrowers to complete a mortgage application as they compare thousands of different products.
How have they done all this? Last week I had the opportunity to sit down with Ben Robinson, Aimeelene Gaspar, and Liz Hyde from the Sindeo team to discuss their new product, and what they see coming next in this ever evolving space.
When did your team start working on your new Digital Mortgage product?
We began building out our platform about two years ago starting with the release of a Mortgage Advisory facing application last year and a Consumer facing application this past September.
How much time is being saved by the consumer?
In less than five minutes a consumer can complete their application and receive a prequalification letter.
In order to provide such a streamlined experience, how many mortgage technology vendors did you have to connect to?
Currently five vendors; we plan to expand this to several more in the coming year.
How did you choose the vendors you worked with as a part of this process?
Primarily it is the availability of robust data and functionality that is typically available in the vendor’s online application through APIs as well as the support provided for these APIs. We value being able to own and drive the user experience core to our value proposition. Our use of the API by ourselves and our partners to access our data is also another key element to our selection.
Did you find certain data difficult to retrieve from APIs or wasn’t available?
The integrity of the data is key in that if there is any data duplicated across different APIs, this data should be consistent. In some cases there were issues in seeing different data for the same elements from different APIs.
On the opposite side of this, did you find any set of partners easy to work with?
Those with well documented, tested and very well supported APIs are those who are working best with us to support us in our initiatives.
How long did it take you to integrate Mortech APIs in to your product?
This took about two months, including implementation and testing.
What benefits do you see to having pricing and eligibility in the digital mortgage experience?
Key to the ability for consumers to have full transparency into what are all the available programs they can be eligible for and understanding all the details about each loan so that they can make a well informed decision.
What does the Mortgage Origination process look like in 5 years?
In my opinion, it would be for the consumer to be able to obtain a loan within minutes rather than days/weeks.
If you would like to learn more about the Product Selection and Pricing APIs Sindeo utilizes in their SindeoOne application, please contact the Mortech Sales Department.