An inside-the ballpark viewpoint
As head of a digital closing platform for the mortgage industry, Sachdev is privy to the inner workings of numerous mortgage lenders. Given his perch, he revealed which of the two options – tech investment or staff cuts – is the better option.
“I actually think that tech is the better way,” he said. “I say this because we work with a number of data providers and we measure the back office operations – loan production and closing. What we’ve been able to measure is the companies using technology are able to manage their costs and drive better outcomes than those who aren’t using technology. The more you can reduce that fixed cost base, the more resilient you are to volume fluctuations.”
Turning to Amazon for lessons on efficiency
Joseph LaMontagne, CEO of Priority Title & Escrow, agreed. He likened efficiencies of scale achieved through technology to those seen at giant online retailer Amazon.
“When I think about efficiency, I tend to think about Amazon,” he said. “I’m sure everyone here has bought something from Amazon before. It’s so easy to go and find the thing you want and hit one button and it shows up at your doorstep the next day or in two days. And when we think about the loan process, we need to keep that in the back of our mind. Is this thing we’re doing – the software that we’re creating, the efficiency we’re trying to put in – moving the needle in that direction? If the answer to that is ‘yes’, then I think we’re headed in the right direction.”
It’s not just an abstraction at his company, he suggested, but something that has been put into place. “That’s our goal, to make that process as seamless as possible,” he said. “For us, we’ve spent a lot of time and effort over the last year retooling our processes, becoming more efficient, investing in technology and all those things to move in that direction.”
Source: mpamag.com