Key Takeaways:
- Learn what millennials and Gen Z want most from the mortgage buying experience, and how it differs from Gen X and boomers, as well as what lenders and brokers can do to improve the customer experience for these generations.
- Gain a better understanding of the most important pain points in the mortgage buying and refinancing process and what consumers are willing to do in order to improve the experience and speed up the lending process.
- Learn how price sensitivity impacts the home buying process as mortgage rates rise; as well as the other factors that affect consumer decision making.
Announcer (
Welcome back from lunch. Please welcome the content marketing strategist for Verizon and your moderator for the next session. Michael Moser.
Michael Moser (
Yes, we are gonna spend some time learning about what consumers want in a mortgage, lending process. So, I'm your host and moderator. I'm joined here on stage, by Sonu Mittal, President Head of Mortgage for Citizens and Bob Jennings, Executive Collateral and Risk Solutions at Core Logic. So, welcome gentlemen. Thank you. Thank you for being here.
(
So, what we're gonna do is we're gonna cover a research project, a research study that was conducted by Verizon and National Mortgage News, and it was sponsored by Core Logic. We're going to review some of the results that we've seen, and we're gonna hear from two industry experts, very knowledgeable in the process of, their reactions, and what they think it means to the industry. Back in May 2022, we surveyed about a thousand consumers. It was split 50% about new home buyers, so new into the mortgage process and 50% into the refi market. So, we could understand what people look for in that process. And the purpose was really to understand the consumer perceptions and expectations and how that would affect the mortgage, industry. So, let's talk about borrower satisfaction. Now, I was talking to Sonu a little earlier, and this chart sort of reminded me about what, dinner last night. So I, came here, wanted to grab something quick to eat, and I was looking up through all the reviews and I saw three stars, four stars, five stars. And when I think about the dinner and the mortgage lending process, yes, there is an intersection, in terms of the people that are very satisfied. In the survey that we did, five stars we're at about a 50 to 60% level. And, I don't know if I could eat at a restaurant that was basically a three star restaurant. So maybe I'll ask you Sonu, What are your thoughts on that?
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah, no, you're not gonna eat at a three star restaurant, if I have to. Yeah, no, I think, this survey is spot on, right? It is that there's so much more work, which still needs to happen in our industry. As Bob and I were talking about last 20 years, we've had a refi boom every three years. So, when you think about, we've made good progress as an industry when it comes to digitization and technology and connecting those items, but at the same time, there's still so much more to do and every few years we get distracted, rightfully so, to monetize and capitalize on the opportunity, which is coming our way. But when you look at now next three years, everyone's looking at how they can reduce the cost to originate, how they can take friction out of the process. And, we are gonna have to do it for real this time because, most of the country have refind over the last two years. So, it's gonna be all about how you take all the properties, all the things you know about the customer, how you, leverage it already. And I think what you see on the data here is folks on the refi side are a little bit more satisfied still, not something which we should be, very thrilled about, but at the same time, they expect that the process is gonna be a certain way they've done it before. Whereas new home purchase, there's a lot of first time home buyers. There's a lot of different, minorities which are also buying, homes. And, they're not used to the amount of times we ask them for documents or what all the things they have to provide, because that's still, a big thing to go. So, I wasn't really surprised. I think we have lot more work to do as an industry. And, I think I would just say one last thing is there's been good traction on when it comes to income and the assets, but I still think there's a lot more work which needs to happen when it comes to collateral, especially with the help from the GSC's and others.
Michael Moser (
Yeah Bob, I guess I'd want to ask you if you could frame it, cuz there are a couple areas that are of key concern, the difference between the refi and the buyers. It's that lender transparency all the way on the left, big delta there. Then you've got the speed and convenience of closing. And, I think with what Suno was talking about is digitizing, there's that probably the lowest rating here is the availability of the digital tools and platforms. Are the tools that Sonu is really talking about. Are they more internal things that I don't see as a consumer?
Bob Jennings (
Yeah, I mean, it's interesting just looking at the data to start, right? and, and you kind of touched on this a little bit before, but I look at these numbers and it says, man, right? Like across the board, it doesn't matter what we're doing. The perception from the consumer is you guys are doing okay, Right? But it could clearly be a lot better. And then to your point, getting into, transparency up front, right? Getting into, modernizing the closing process. There's, been a lot of effort that's been put into that over the last call it 10, 15 years. But to so's point, that he made before, we, seem to get taken off track every three years or so. And, and these projects never really seem to run themselves out. So, now is really that time to buckle down and, and start implementing the solutions that are out there that will address these problems that, consumers have identified for us.
Michael Moser (
I'll ask you this, on this next slide, the question here is the expectation. And to me this was a surprise having done mortgages and refied my own personal, going out to the consumer body and asking, What is your expectation of how long a mortgage, should take from the point where I sign on the dotted line to it's closed and almost two thirds, one to three weeks. And, when I look at Freddie Mac data, the typical mortgage takes about 43 days, and I guess sonu. Is there a danger here that consumer expectation is here and the delivery is so many days later?
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah, I think, I'm not actually surprised by the data. When you see Gen Z and millennials, there's used to their smart phones or smart tablets.
Michael Moser (
Their Supporters.
Sonu Mittal (
Right? And, there's used to pressing a button and getting everything. Like you'll think about, I was, we were, at one of the hotels yesterday and, there was no cab and which is very not typical when you come to Vegas, there's cabs lined up everywhere. And the first thing I did was went to Uber ordered it and, and gone, right? So I think when you think about, everyone who is going to be most of the home ownership, when you think about the aging of the demographics across the country, they are expecting that, you know so much about me, already I'm pretty much, all my information is out there on the cloud or whatever you want to call it, right? How are you not taking advantage of it and making this, much smoother process, much faster process. I don't think anybody's gonna say they don't want something to happen fast. And I think the last piece is they wanna spend more time focused on what color they're gonna paint the walls, what furniture they're gonna buy, rather than when am I gonna get my commitment from the underwriter. So, I think e obviously need to expedite that. And I think it starts also with not just digitizing a aspect of the business, as Bob and I were talking the other day, it gotta be end to end. you can't just digitize, put a very fancy UI UX experience front and then expect everything else's. Still very human intensive.
Michael Moser (
Is there an opportunity here then, Bob, in terms of, for a company or companies that can sort of, close that gap between expectation and reality?
Bob Jennings (
Yeah, and to what Sonu was saying before, right? there's been a lot of work done on the front end. we, we've seen a lot of point of sale activity and but the process really extends itself out in the mid office, right? It's all the collateral that needs to be acquired and brought back in. And, the agencies are actually looking to get pilot programs out there right now to start moving this stuff along a lot faster. And, I think that's where a lot of the challenges exist. It's, cleaning up the appraisal process, cleaning up the title process, those should not take as long as they do, right? But we as an industry have, inserted processes and complexity that just doesn't necessarily need to be there. We should be able to, preceded that information with the data that we already know and move that along in, days, not weeks. But, this slide, it really, it jumps off the, it really jumps out at me when I look at it and it's like, okay, they have a three week expectation. And we talked about this a little bit on the phone, right? A couple of days ago. you think about the only other major asset purchase that a person is going to have in their lifetime, and it's buying an automobile, right? And you can go into an automobile, dealer,
Michael Moser (
I think you mentioned Lamborghini.
Bob Jennings (
Yeah Well, whether it's
Michael Moser (
Change it to afford.
Bob Jennings (
Yeah. Whether it's a Lambo or a new Jeep, Grand Cherokee, that's six figures, right? it's still a major purchase and you can be in and out of there in three hours and two hours of that is the salesperson trying to upsell you on a bunch of crap you don't actually need. Right?
Michael Moser (
Right.
Bob Jennings (
So, you compare that as a consumer to 42 days and there's just a huge disconnect there, right? and that's really what we need to start driving into.
Michael Moser (
Now, speaking about technology, I want to talk about communications. Cuz this was an interesting part of the study where we looked at how people communicate with their brokers, their mortgage lenders, and what we saw, by and large, everybody loves email and everybody likes to pick up the phone or, when that happens. But, the online portal, which I, recently used for a purchase, I really enjoyed it, but didn't find as much favor in the market. Maybe it's new, maybe it's not, sort of that, latest and greatest. But one thing we found that was very common, is that the younger generations had a very good adoption of mobile app, video zoom, et cetera, and we're all sick of Zoom now. And then the in person meeting, which to me was a little surprising that younger people want that in person meeting. But, just, just your thoughts here. I mean, I guess sonu, that's a lot of channels, and does it, I mean, is that a challenge? What does that mean for a bank or a lender?
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah, I actually loved, this slide, and the data here, because it kind of then tells you is that you can't just only have one way of communicating with the customers. You've gotta meet them where, how they want to communicate with you. So, either it's, if someone wants end to end, self-service, they can do that. If someone wants, low touch, you can do that. And if someone wants high touch, you have to have that as well. I think the other piece which I take away from, this one is, when you think about buying a home is still one of the biggest transactions or investments you're gonna do in your lifetime, and it's still very highly emotional. so as you think about, some of the folks who are on the younger side who are looking to buy their first home, they still are looking for local experts in some way. Now how much they want to leverage them in every aspect of the transaction may change. But I think that's really what this is saying is that, which goes back to my earlier comment is we need to make sure our, the role of the loan officer or the role of the advisors need to become more providing options and validating the data rather than collecting the data and be like, I know how to look at, mortgage pricing sheets seven different ways, which customer doesn't really, is interested.
Michael Moser (
Does that raise the level of, on time available data or knowledge within the organization? I mean, if you're going to an online portal, a mobile app, you're making a phone call, all three of those channels really have to have the same data. Where is the loan right now? Who's desk is it sitting on? Does it sort of raise that bar at the lender? At the broker?
Bob Jennings (
Yeah, for sure. I mean, there needs to be a fidelity of data right across channels and across, access methods for the consumer. And, and if that doesn't exist, clearly those customer sat ratings that were in the 50% before are gonna go much lower, right? So, the consistency of data across, across the mediums clearly needs to be there. It's really, it's fascinating though that there's so many different methods for them to communicate. And I think we need to keep in mind as an industry that every consumer is gonna come in and out of some of these, right? It's, not gonna be, I'm gonna start with the online portal and go all the way through every time. A lot of folks are gonna come in and out, and
Michael Moser (
So you might text say, or pick up the phone.
Bob Jennings (
Yeah, It needs to be a multimedia, strategy in order to really effectively communicate with the consumers.
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah. And, I think the other point I'll also share is that the, when you look at all this data is that we can't, when a customer is reaching out to us as a lender or a broker or whatever channel you are in, to me, you've already failed. They shouldn't have to reach out to you. We need to make sure it's the same way when we use all the apps on our phone, you're getting updates on what's happening, right? How far, and I keep using Uber as example is Uber is this far away, this is where it is. That's right. Rather than me going in and keep looking at where's Uber, where is Uber right? Or where is whatever, because mortgages day by day becoming a commodity, right? So, how do we make sure it's a waste, right? Of, I a lot of folks in the audience probably also, when you think about customers calling in, that's a waste and we have to make sure that we are giving them that data in a timely fashion.
Michael Moser (
Well when we look at how the level of satisfaction for the different channels that we had up there, the in-person meetings really squared out of the part. I guess that's part of the personalization really answering the questions. Whereas when we get down to further away to the Zoom online portal, not as strong maybe. And, I think, Bob, this may be your fidelity of data question where does it have to, does each channel have to be informed at the same level with the same data?
Bob Jennings (
Yeah, I mean clearly they do. And, and I wonder how much of that though is a little bit of covid backlash around Zoom. People are a little zoomed out. But, it really, it goes back to what we were talking about before where you you have to meet people where they want to be. And, and clearly in person meetings are still of high value to the consumer base. And if we're not there, making that experience enjoyable for them, we're all going to suffer. But, these numbers are actually relatively strong though across the board when you look at 'em from a satisfaction perspective, it, they don't really correlate with the overall perception of.
Michael Moser (
Just how that individual channel is working and getting what I need out of it.
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah. And I think it's also, as you talk about the pandemic that also had an impact on, given, there's a lot more complexity, right? No doubt. We are seeing things adjust little bit in the marketplace, but given when you have, you are one of the 62 offers which are gonna be placed on a house, you gotta spend a little bit more time thinking through it. So, I think there's lot more, diligence folks we're doing, or waving appraisal continuously or all those things. I do think, to Bob's point that all of them are equally strong, I do think we are all going through the Zoom or WebEx fatigue or whatever you want to call it, but I think all these are relevant, which is, goes back to that. You have to have, be willing to meet your customers where they want to do business with you.
Michael Moser (
I wanna switch gears here, talk about frustrations. And, I'm sure that there's a lot of war stories out there, and I, can't say that maybe there's a handful of people in the audience that have gone through mortgage and not seen that frustration. But I thought this was very interesting in terms of when we ask consumers what frustrated them the most in the mortgage process, and it was this collecting, submitting and resubmitting personal information, I thought I sent you my pay stub. Oh, it's too old now, I'm sending it to you again. And that was sort of the top issue there with delays too long to close, excessive unexpected fees and lack of communication in the transparency of the process. I, almost want to ask, are these all interrelated? I mean, if you're asking me for that pay stub, that's gonna force me to delay the close, which I might incur that extra fee for something, and I didn't really know that in advance, Are they, is that sort of true that these are all in a way intertwined?
Bob Jennings (
No, for sure. I mean, it's, the same thing that you hear from consumers over and over again, right? Like, you know everything about me. Why is it taking so long? everything about this property. Why do we need to do, x, y, and Z inspection? It's that lack of transparency and expectation setting up front and then, delivering a consistency of around the data that they submit going forward that we seem to be missing out on. And, so I think as an industry, if we can start to narrow down on those activities, we'll start to see these satisfaction numbers start to increase.
Michael Moser (
Is there a document opportunity here? I mean, I think if, we're just really focused on the documents themselves or the collection of data, is there an opportunity around that? I mean, I think about just some of the ads you see on tv, where data is prefilled or it's, as easy as a click of a button. Do, are you sure you wanna be sure what's the difference? We know those ads, but, it feels like that there's an opportunity here.
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah, I think So a couple of things. One, I've never heard of. Word frustration in mortgage industry is the first time I'm seen. And, there's not a lot of frustration around in the mortgage industry at all. So, I have no idea what they're talking about. Now Joke aside, nobody really laughed. But going back to this, I think it goes back to what Bob said. I mean, you have to set the right expectations upfront. You wanna spend a little bit more time upfront with the customer, rather than having them learn the process with you. I think the second piece is you also have to do equally, the same amount of time and energy you have to spend aligning internally. Because what I see a lot of times is, the customer has a loan officer, then they have a processor, then they have another person involved from the title company or all these folks. But we need to be clear to the customer who is quarterbacking the whole transaction, Who's gonna be the person who will be reaching out and providing you updates proactively. Because sometimes we've all seen this happen is I'll call Michael and I'll ask for a document and Michael will be like, I already sent it to Bob, but I'll send it again to you. And you send it twice. And now we both think, okay, that's gonna be efficient, but that's not efficient for Michael. Right? So, I think there's some work which needs to be done there. I do think there's, we also have to continue to evolve our role in this cycle. So, I look at it as if you are on the front, end of the transaction, you have to embrace, some of the digital tools which are available. I think one of the things we are gonna touch on is you can have all the automated income, automated assets, all these things available, but if you are not embracing them, you, all you did is just add a lot of cost into your process and not make it easier for the customers. So, I think there's, the role needs to go from, again, collecting the data to more validating the data and making sure that it's still relevant. It's still the right information between.
Michael Moser (
Is is there pushback? I mean this is what the consumers are saying, everything about me. I sent you the document twice, or I sent it to you and Bob. But now you're saying in terms of the, some lenders or and brokers, they're, they're, they're employing these tools or they're buying these tools yet not fully utilizing them. There's an apprehension. I sense in your tone and what you're saying that internally in the mortgage industry, there's an apprehension to use some of the tools that we're even demoed today.
Bob Jennings (
I think it comes down to there's this inherent, lack of trust in data within the mortgage industry that, that kind of baffles me a little bit, right? we will, we have all this data at our fingertips and it can be served up to any lender at any point in time, and really aimed at streamlining the process, but yet we'll still put checkers in to check the checkers of this data that has a level of certainty and fidelity that isn't going to be changed regardless. And it just kind of, it's this lack of trust around data that I think is kind of at the core of this.
Michael Moser (
Doesn't that add cost time, Yeah. Potential for missteps. Well, I wanna talk about the data that, the consumers send. And what was interesting when we looked at the borrowers, they tended to use the same method to supply all the materials. And I don't know whether this is necessarily, the broker or the lender that's saying, Okay, I have a secure portal, this is where it all has to go, or I need a physical document. But generally, in the consumers that we surveyed for both refi and purchase, they would use the same channel. And I think one of the things that to me was very interesting, having done this in a recent experience, and I wanna ask you Sonu about, the permissioned online access. I thought it was wonderful when I did that, for a purchase. It was like night and day compared to, a refi did on another property that had to send in the pay stubs twice because the time took so long that the pay stubs that they needed had to be fresher than 30 days or something like that. So, I had to resubmit three, two, 6%, online access. Does that surprise you that it, the adoption is so low when in the indu when the consumers in the survey said 70% raise their hand said they would use that, yet when we look at the actual usage, you're only at two 3%. Does that surprise you?
Sonu Mittal (
I think it does. And it's a good, interesting outcome while we are sitting at digital mortgage, when we are talking about digitizing the mortgage company as, or digitizing the overall experience. So, I think, again, it goes back to what Bob was saying, right? It says, even though you have those tools, if we are not trusting the system and leveraging them, when we are, having the customers walk through when they're, become from prospect to a, application, it's not all you did is add a lot of cost and additional maintenance, which you have to do. So I think it's absolutely, is those numbers need to move up a lot. And that goes back to is are we setting, the customer up to be able to do that while not forgetting the person who's the single point of contact or whoever's working with the customer, are they bought into the tools and digitization as much as the company may have bought into it.
Michael Moser (
Right? I mean, we have still have a quarter of the people, they're either dropping off paper documents to your broker or they're FedExing them. I mean, in today's day and age and quarter to me seems like a lot.
Bob Jennings (
Well, and they're sending PDFs and photos via email and text, which is absolutely not secure. And yet they're afraid to go into this, this granted permission world, which, tends to be a little bit more secure and tokenized and, and, there are a lot of aspects around that. It'll be really interesting to see kind of what happens over the next couple of years as, as we get into more of a purchase market and how much this starts to shift and if people start to adopt this type of, distribution of their own identity, to really accelerate these processes, right? Because, that's really at the heart of it. It, you want something to take three weeks? Well, you gotta give granted permission up front.
Michael Moser (
Well I wanna go back to a point that Sonu made and almost feels like the banks, the banks are putting people, they're making the people who want the mortgage, Yes, I want the mortgage. Yes, I want the refi, but now you're making me own the documents that are already out there, or I already bank with you should have the documents. Don't make me get those documents. I mean, should the banks, the brokers, the investors ultimately shouldn't they own the documents and push it forward? I mean, really turn it on its end to say, instead of, Michael, send me your W 2, or to Bob, what you're saying is, I need this access and we're gonna come back with the portfolio of documents. All you have to do is verify. And granted, some people might just do like their at t or Verizon, contract where you don't really read it. But I think in the case of, buying house, your biggest, typically your biggest, shouldn't the people making the loan actually own the documents and then come back to you?
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah, I think best spot on, right? And what I would say is it's not gonna always be that case, but especially on a refi transaction, most of the time it's a repeat customer. If you provide a great experience that you should be able to leverage that data. And, there's a lot of work, which is the comment I was saying earlier is you can't just focus externally, you gotta also focus internally. Is your data aligned in a way the fidelity of data is that is, can be used and reused multiple times by different groups, right? And I don't only just look at mortgage, I look at a home equity or a personal loan that we know more about a customer when they do a mortgage with us than any other lending product across consumer. So are we leveraging that, to again, prefill and validate? And I think the second piece in all this is we, again, I keep going back to, is we have to make sure that we create more believership of how these tools will actually not, eliminate the role of the person who's bringing these customers or into the funnel. They will actually be able to go and do 40% more business. So they're spending less time
Michael Moser (
Leadership among the, I guess the, among the point of sale?
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah.
Michael Moser (
Okay.
Sonu Mittal (
Ellos brokers, anyway, you think about where your customer acquisition happens.
Michael Moser (
What about the believers among the consumers? I think while 70% said yes, we would grant, permissioned online access who still had 30% were, I don't know. And some even said no privacy and security were top issues among the people who didn't want, What needs to be done to sort of raise that bar in terms of get more consumers to go that route? Because clearly if the bank is getting my W2 going to the IRS or getting, the pay stubs through ADP, clearly it takes the load off my hands. But then it also gives a certain degree of confidence for the lender that this is real actual data and hasn't been fudged. I mean, what do loan officers, what do banks, what do they have to do to get consumers to really buy in that this is the way to go?
Bob Jennings (
I think it goes to, the loan officers need to promote it, right? The real estate agents need to promote it. The people that are actually touching and controlling the transaction, and guiding the consumer through it, because the average consumer really has no idea what they're doing on a, on a home purchase. Those people need to be the ones that are the advocates and champion, being the champions of this cause in order for the consumer to adopt.
Michael Moser (
Well, it's interesting you mentioned that, and that's a great segue because finding a new lender is the next sort of section as we get in there at last section, in terms of what buyers do before they go out and they plunk down one of the 62 offers, which was probably now only 42 offers on a house, 9 out of 10 people are going out there and doing something online and, getting pre proof for loan prequal, understanding what are the current rates, checking my bank, looking for that real estate agent and really trying to get out there and get smarter in the process. Sonu, are bank not doing enough to meet the consumer in the digital space. If you got nine outta 10 people going out there to do something online and to clearly get preapproved or pre-qualified, I've gotta provide some data. Is that an opportunity for the banks to really reach out and are they not doing it?
(
Yeah, I think when you think about bank, right, it's a very broad term. When you think about the role of bank branches, I think that's what you're referring to is if cuz the traffic continues to go down. When you think about the, I was thinking about when was the last time I went to a bank branch to conduct a transaction that was a couple days ago, that, wanted to get some cash so that way I could have some spending money, let's call it. Right? for this trip.
(
I know there's an ATM over there.
Sonu Mittal (
Exactly. But I, look at it as the role of what we go to bank branches have changed. So when I look at it is all of us, when we think about anything we write away, take out our phone and either Google it or, we go to one of the pages we are following or other social media properties. And, I think again, it goes back to you've gotta be relevant in all those places, right? So if I, Google about, home buying, I get a lot of content, which is, a lot of times actually very good for you to do some self education so that way you can make sure you're making the best and the most informed decision.
Bob Jennings (
I look at this and I'm wondering who the 13% dinosaurs are.
Michael Moser (
They're the ones dropping off the paper.
Bob Jennings (
Yeah, right. I, mean I guess they're cash buyers in this market. I'm not really too sure, but, I mean every time I've bought a home, I've put in work before.
Michael Moser (
We could say there's a margin of error here. So, okay. But when I think about finding that mortgage provider, and I think the segue that you mentioned earlier, the educator, we need to educate and I think the one that you mentioned, Bob was the realtor and Sonu mentioned the bank. And so one out of four mortgage providers are found through the realtor, and the realtor, whether it's the realtor saying, I use this guy or girl, or we've done several deals, or they have great rates, I don't know what it is, but, and I know Bob, we were talking about, last week where, there was always a question of is the realtor going the way of the dinosaur? And clearly, I hope mortgage providers are not relying on a dinosaur, in terms of getting you leads because one out of four are coming from, the realtor and then you've got one out of five people going to their own bank.
Bob Jennings (
It's a complex transaction, right? And, despite the fact that they're, I Buyers and all sorts of other activities out there, and, and opportunities to purchase a home without a realtor, I've, I'm been in this industry since 2006 and, and I would consider myself very well versed. I wouldn't go buy a home without a realtor at this point in time. I don't want to deal with the hassle of all the paperwork and everything that comes with that. So, but they're, incented to get the deal done as fast as they possibly can with certainty, right? Like the last thing a realtor wants to do is lose a deal and they're not really ready yet to bet on this technology. So, I think it's an education process out at the realtor level to start getting their trust so the consumer will start to follow in behind.
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah, and I thinkagain, I go back to is one, I was not shocked by this at all, that, the real estate agents are still driving, a lot of those transactions. But I think, again the role of the real estate agent also has to change. And I've seen a lot of them change where they're, not just, Hey, here's the 76 pages you have to sign, right? They're more about, Let me tell you why you should consider this home over this one. What is important to you in the transaction? And I think you see that a lot of times at the higher price points on home purchases. Now you're starting to see that at different, given there's so much first home, first time home buyers out there, right? So, I say is I think they're gonna continue to be very relevant. Their role is gonna have to continue to evolve. And goes back to the other point I was making is that you have to have, I'm not saying you have to have local presence to win every market, but you have to have some element of it. because what works in Boston may not work in Detroit and what works in Detroit doesn't work in Nashville, right? Or whatever markets you may pick. And you need to make sure you truly take the time to understand your customer and guide them in the best place.
Michael Moser (
Does, does the 20% I went to my primary bank or credit union surprise you? I mean, I would think that, is it that competitive? Is it that, I guess commoditized that we're thinking about, this is my transactional bank where maybe I have a savings checking, maybe even have a home equity or, car loan, but that going to your primary bank and credit union seems to be even below the realtor.
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah, I think I'm not surprised by that. And I actually thought it was a little bit higher than what I would've said given, over 60% of the in mortgage industry share is now controlled by non-bank. And when I look at that is, I think it goes back to it's probably, I would love to double click on that and see that representation across this, across the country, because there's probably states where it performs very differently because their states or pockets where they're like, Okay, my parents banked here, so I'm gonna walk in and talk to the same banker and then there's others who are like, I don't really, care about where my parents banked. I want to find the best deal, which is out there and I may be leveraging other resources as well.
Michael Moser (
Speaking of our last, slide in terms of the factors, what people look at when they find that lender, clearly the competitive mortgage interest rate, I don't wanna be paying more than I should was clearly than number one, but number two, that lender transparency about the process, what to expect, the application fees, which I, no surprises. And then the next two are around speed, that speed of preapproval pre-qual. So, I can go in as quickly make that, offer. And then speed of convenience and closing. I, guess what, what are your guys' thoughts in terms of that lender transparency, issue cuz that keeps coming up and it feels like that there's, I don't know whether it's an education issue, but that transparency of where are we in the process? What am I missing?
Bob Jennings (
Yeah, so competitive mortgage rates, it just for that to be listed alone by itself right? Kind of says that its relatively commoditized because everything else that you look at underneath that is exactly what we're talking about. How do you educate the consumer? How do you, provide more clarity up front? How do you, provide, speed throughout the process? How do you provide that Uber tracker, right? Or the FedEx tracker that lets the consumer know exactly where their loan is at the time that they want to pick up their phone and, and see what they need to do. It's fascinating to me that those really make up the bulk of the factors that are involved there.
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah. And I think for me it comes down to it's really three fees, communication, convenience, and care, right? If you, as Bob said, it's all commoditized, the rates are very close, mostly when you look at the lenders. So it comes down to are you communicating at the right time through the right avenues? Are you making it convenient for me? so that way I'm not spending a lot of my time because this is not my full time job. I have a job, which I do. And, then the third is the care. Are you doing it in a, do you genuinely care about me getting into that house and make it, long a life there rather than just, it's a transaction to you because are you speaking in the terms or a language which the customer understands, right? Rather than all the jargons or all the things speaking mortgage speak. Yes. Which we talk about.
Bob Jennings (
Yeah, our industry's so esoteric to begin with that, consumers don't know what title insurance is. They don't understand how the appraisal process works. If you're gonna start throwing rate language and, and mortgage speak Adam, on top of that, you've lost them.
Michael Moser (
I guess gentlemen, as we, we come to close here, any last thoughts that you wanna share with the audience? Bob, I guess could maybe you start and then sonu,
Bob Jennings (
Yeah, sure. Well really I'd go back to how Sonu opened it, which is, we've been in basically in elongated refi cycle for 20 years. And that is prevented us as an industry from truly advancing the tech that drives our industry. And, now's our opportunity to dig in and take care of that. We're going to see a, a elongated purchase market here for three, four years plus. And, if we don't take the opportunity to really make significant changes, shame on us.
Sonu Mittal (
Yeah. And I think, again, the two things I'll just say is again, communication, convenience, care, that's really something you have to think about. and not just put it on a pretty PowerPoint, but really do things around it and make sure your roadmap will continues to help with that. And the other piece, which I know is, pretty much everyone knows about it, but I don't think we all do it as effectively, is, are we taking the time to review the customer verbatims or the surveys? and taking that as a, not just feedback, but as a gift to really pressure test, not be like, Oh, don't worry about that, that customer just is a tough customer. That can't be the answer, Right? To most of the time when I get exact, the complaints in my mailbox, I send it to the team, they're like, Yeah, yeah, that customer was just not, ready for whatever it is. And is that really the truth? And, so we really need to dig deep and, do root cause on that and make sure we truly feel like we are working back from customer lens, rather than getting caught up in, is that, hey, if we've reached a certain NPS level or customer satisfaction, you get complacent. Because to your point, you said earlier, Michael, is the customer expectations just keep rising. Once we get these things done, they're gonna be expecting, by the time we get to 15 days, they'll be expecting to close in 24 hours Right? So, we gotta we gotta, we gotta keep pushing along.
Michael Moser (
Well, gentlemen, I want to thank you for spending time with us this afternoon and thank the audience for joining our session.