Mortgage technology

The electronic registry for tracking ownership of mortgage loans and servicing rights has been expanded to allow the registration of loans where MERS is not the mortgagee of record. These "information only" registrations are being called MERS iRegistrations, and they give members the anti-fraud and tracking benefits of a "MERS as original mortgagee" registration without naming MERS as the mortgagee. The iRegistration procedure can be used to register a loan prior to closing, MERS said. The MERS website is www.mersinc.com.

Phoenix Capital, a Denver-based provider of mortgage servicing analytics, consulting and brokerage services, will begin using Compass's CompassPoint technology in determining the value of mortgage servicing rights. CompassPoint will be used by Phoenix as the cash flow engine and model with which Phoenix applies its market color and assumptions to generate valuations and analytics for MSR portfolios. The two companies said the transition to the Compass technology should be complete by the end of this month.

California's Nevada and Placer counties have selected Lender Processing Services Inc.'s Aptitude Solutions' division to provide a software solution that further automates and streamlines land recording and indexing for both counties. OnCore, Aptitude Solutions' recording and indexing platform enables county governments of all sizes to reduce internal paperwork and easily manage workflow by electronically moving document images through the recording process, rather than through traditional manual and paper-intensive processes. OnCore's features include electronic recording, automatic document queuing, electronic digital stamping, historic image back posting, full accounting functionality. Nevada County will become the first county in California to implement Aptitude Solutions' OnCore platform for electronic land records indexing and e-recording. Placer County also plans to implement the OnCore platform to handle high-volume recording and to provide increased automation and detailed audit checks.

Avista Solutions has integrated the Avista Agile loan origination system with DocMagic, a loan document solution provider. The integration to DocMagic streamlines the loan document production process for Avista Solutions customers, giving Avista customers access to DocMagic's e-disclosure and e-sign features. DocMagic's interface with Avista's Agile LOS is a direct interface. DocMagic's e-disclosure feature allows lenders to deliver and get receipt confirmations of disclosure documents via e-mail. DocMagic monitors the entire e-disclosure process, notifying lenders when borrowers view their documents and mailing printed copies of the documents to borrowers if they fail to view them electronically within 48 hours.

ISGN has purchased Richmond Title Services, Plano, Texas, as part of its title business cross-sell strategy. RTS is one of the top 25 independent title agents in the US and has more than 40 employees. According to ISGN, the plan is to cross-sell RTS's services to existing ISGN customers as well as through ISGN's e-services platform, Lenstar, Bridgelink and the MORvision Plug-in Partner Network. A plug-in will be written for all Dynatek MORvision customers. ISGN said in a prepared statement that the acquisition will help ISGN gain market share in the title business by leveraging ISGN's knowledge process outsourcing onshore and offshore processing capabilities. No sale price was disclosed.

Best known for its Funding Suite credit and AVM product, Cogent Road is expanding its offerings to enable lenders to go fully paperless with Business Spaces, an e-collaboration document management system designed to first help lenders eliminate paper and gradually move to full electronic processes. Business Spaces automates work processes by delivering documents, tracking their status and notifying key workgroups of issues that may delay closing. The moment a loan officer orders a credit report, a Business Space is created and the applicant is notified via e-mail. The loan applicant enters a private, secured environment through which he or she can view, e-sign or upload documents directly into the Business Space via computer, fax or an easy-to-use virtual printer. Further, the borrower can also communicate using micro-blogs and discussion threads integrated in different areas within the Business Space. With automatic audit logging, all borrower actions are effectively tracked for compliance purposes. As the loan progresses, the Business Space evolves into a collaborative workspace enabling communication between the loan officer and title agents, notary agents, appraisers and real estate agents.

Subservicer Ofori Lender Services, Southfield, Mich., plans to service all of its loans through a new system in January in a move it said is slated to save it $2,500 in telecommunication costs. Ofori said it plans to service its loans through the Southfield, Mich.-based McDonald Computer Corp.'s Web-based system during the upcoming month. "By greatly reducing our cost on technology and management portfolios, we will become a more competitive subservicer," said Karen Heller, Ofori Lending Services' servicing manager.

Wipro Technologies, the global IT services business of Wipro Ltd., and Citigroup Inc. said that they have reached an agreement for Wipro to acquire Citi Technology Services Ltd., the India-based provider of information technology services and solutions to Citi entities worldwide, for an all cash consideration of $127 million. As part of the transaction, Wipro and Citi will sign a master services agreement for the delivery of technology infrastructure services and application development and maintenance services for a period of six years. The agreement provides for the delivery of at least $500 million in service revenue over the period of the contract. The transaction is expected to be closed by March 2009, subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals.

Real estate website Zillow.com has launched Zillow Advice, an online resource for consumers to find answers to specific local real estate questions. Located in the "Advice" tab on Zillow.com, Zillow Advice encourages consumers to "Ask a Question," tag it by topic or locality, and receive advice from Zillow's online community of local real estate experts. Zillow Advice adds to existing community features such as Zillow Discussions and Home Q&A, which allow for broader discussion topics or home-specific questions and answers. Currently, more than 40,000 contributions are made to Zillow.com by its community of users each day, according to Zillow.

Fraud prevention firm National Loan Auditors, Walnut Creek, Calif., is now offering an online resource portal aimed at providing clients with up-to-date information on statutes and case law pertaining to lending and foreclosure. The portal includes status updates on all federal, state and municipal legislation, the company said. "NLA Law Portal adds value to our forensic loan audit by providing support for its findings and information on how to effectively use the audit report in legal proceedings," said August Blass, CEO of National Loan Auditors. "Users are given summaries and guidelines that distill lending and foreclosure law into a short manageable synopsis, saving hours in research." Once access has been granted, clients have the ability to search various summary topics such as alternatives to workout agreements, Truth in Lending Act summary, and Home Ownership and Equity Protection Act action steps. State legislation topics also are available. By selecting a state, users will receive current case law and statues in that state. Litigation tools also will be displayed when applicable.

Harland Financial Solutions' Interlinq E3, the company's Web-based loan production platform management system, is providing complete integration with Compliance EAGLE, an automated compliance review service developed by QuestSoft. Compliance EAGLE offers Interlinq E3 users a compliance process within the LOS. Compliance EAGLE uses proprietary rule sets to identify regulatory exceptions. "Harland Financial Solutions has been a valued integration partner of QuestSoft's for more than ten years," said Leonard Ryan, president of QuestSoft in a prepared statement. This integration is said to provide customers with a best practices approach to dealing with regulatory compliance.

Bethesda, Md.-based decisioning and analytics vendor Overture has closed $6 million in Series C funding led by Capital Trust Ventures with continuing participation from CNF Investments, New Markets Growth Fund and other existing investors. Financing will be used to support market expansion to meet urgent and increasing demand for the company's financial decisioning solutions serving the mortgage and education lending industries. In conjunction with the funding, Tim Meyers, managing partner at Capital Trust Ventures, has joined Overture's board of directors.

Dallas-based Vantium Capital Inc. has begun offering electronic modifications through its Acqura Loan Services in an effort to improve and accelerate borrower acceptance. The company is using SigniaDoc's SMART Doc technology to prepare and present the e-mods to borrowers with loans that it services for investors and for its own fund. The borrowers are invited to view their loan modification documents online at a secure portion of Acqura's website and review them on a real-time basis with a representative from Acqura's Home Owner Solutions Center. If they agree with the modification, the borrowers can immediately e-sign the documents online in a secure environment. A growing number of investors will now accept e-signed mods, and federal and state courts have also recognized the validity of e-signed documents for loan modifications, the company said. Once the e-mod has been executed, it is electronically delivered to the investor's custodian and then filed in an e-vault.

Brookfield, Wis.-based Fiserv Inc. has enhanced capabilities to its Home Retention Solutions offering that enable financial institutions to identify and contact troubled borrowers with customized repayment solutions to try to keep them out of foreclosure. In addition, Fiserv is supporting programs such as Fannie Mae's Home Saver Advance Program, which provides an advance to cover past-due mortgage payments in exchange for a separate, unsecured loan, and the newly introduced Streamlined Modification Program, in which borrowers receive reduced interest rates or longer loan terms to make their payments more affordable. Among the enhancements developed since the initial launch of Home Retention Solutions in June 2008 are "one-touch" customer contact and advanced loss mitigation workflow tools that more fully automate the loan modification process, including secure electronic delivery of modification documents to borrowers with an electronic signature option when available. One-touch contact and the electronic fulfillment of the documents dramatically accelerate the completion of the modification process, even enabling the process to be completed in one phone call with the borrower.

Fiserv, Inc. has entered into an agreement to acquire i_Tech Corp., a provider of outsourced account and payment processing services, from First Interstate BancSystem Inc., a multi-state, $6 billion banking organization headquartered in Billings, Montana. The purchase price is $40 million, with an expected closing date of December 31, 2008. i_Tech provides outsourced account processing services as a licensee and reseller of the Fiserv ITI Premier core banking system to financial institutions located primarily in the northern Midwest and West. In addition to account processing services, i_Tech provides its clients with a variety of complementary services including EFT processing and check processing.

Wolters Kluwer Financial Services and MortgageDashboard have integrated Wolters Kluwer Financial Services' Document Services Platform with MortgageDashboard's loan origination system. As a result, lenders using MortgageDashboard's LOS will have access to Wolters Kluwer Financial Services' VMP Mortgage Solutions compliance documents from within the system. The new integration will enable MortgageDashboard users to generate standard and customized closing and initial disclosure documents through Wolters Kluwer Financial Services' Document Services Platform, and then electronically deliver them to borrowers for e-consent and e-signature. The platform also gives lenders the option of completely and securely outsourcing the printing and mailing of paper disclosures when needed or requested by the borrower through Wolters Kluwer Financial Services' SAS 70-certified mail fulfillment center.

Lenders using the LoanQuest loan origination system from MortgageFlex Systems now have easy interface to a broad selection of mortgage insurance providers with an enhancement of the LOS. The ability to exchange "standardized" data promotes a more competitive atmosphere so lending systems are not locked into a single MI vendor and lenders can use their MI company of choice. Lenders utilizing LoanQuest now can select the following mortgage insurers in the loan origination process: Mortgage Guaranty Insurance Corp., United Guaranty Insurance Co., Republic Mortgage Insurance Co., and PMI Mortgage Insurance Co.

Loan Score Decisioning Systems, Irvine, Calif., has launched CommissionPro, a Web-based commission tracking and payout application designed for loan officers, mortgage brokers, sales force management and accounting personnel. CommissionPro automates the administration of commission management - from accounting payout to tracking, forecasting, performance guidance, reporting and the payment of compensation plans. The company says that CommissionPro streamlines processes that are done manually by using Microsoft Excel and internal resources.

Santa Ana, Calif-based First American Document Solutions, realizing the industry need for better post closing due diligence, has launched a new online portal designed to help lenders and servicers reduce their post-closing document management costs and improve investor compliance. The portal, dubbed ePostClosing.com, is a new platform that enables lenders and servicers to handle all of their document retrieval, trailing document, lien release and assignment tasks through a single online system. The platform offers customers instant access to the nation's largest property database, which includes more than 4 billion imaged records and access to a nationwide network of abstractors and field researchers. The services that are available online through ePostClosing.com include nationwide document retrieval, trailing documents and title policy retrieval, lien release services, assignment services, data solution and electronic vaulting.

VirPack has launched a new e-collaboration platform designed to help lenders transition from paper, to paperless, to electronic. The platform is a Web-based system built using C-Sharp programming language on Microsoft's .NET framework. The platform, dubbed Enterprise Center, was designed from the ground up with the particular needs of the correspondent and wholesale lender in mind. New features include multilayered security at user, loan and document levels, Web-based query, viewing, editing and central administration, and a suite of Web-based upload tools for documents and files from remote users, branches, business partners, brokers and even borrowers. Enterprise Center supports a hybrid document environment to ease the transition from paper-based processes to an e-document world. A new scan application allows remote capture with indexing and the new virtual print driver allows users to add content from any application.