Technology

The Bank on Real Estate, Lexington, Mass., has announced that E-Loan has become the first lender customer using a co-branded website that attracts purchase borrowers by offering easy MapQuest access to homes for sale in selected major markets across the country.The BoRE announcement calls this "the first MLS-compliant IDX listing architecture that can be co-branded by lenders." The bank said that after visitors use the site, BoRE accepts their volunteered information, incubates their home search, calls out to test their readiness to buy and borrow, and then delivers the prospects to participating lenders and real estate brokers who have pledged not to poach the lender's referrals. Widely considered a refinance specialist since it first launched, online pioneer E-Loan is using its BoRE site to expand purchase loan business. The co-branded website can be found online at http://eloan.bankonrealestate.net.

The National Foundation for Credit Counseling, Silver Spring, Md., has announced the launch of the Mortgage Reality Check to help homeowners determine whether they are at risk of losing their homes.Developed by housing experts, the "easy-to-take quiz" is designed to help homeowners understand their situation, identify problems, and provide guidance about options and where to turn for help, the foundation said. "Even if foreclosure seems inevitable, there may be options that can help in certain circumstances," the NFCC said. The Mortgage Reality Check is located within the NFCC's Homeowner Crisis Resource Center, which also provides direct access to certified housing counselors and homeowner information and financial tools. The center can be found at http://www.housinghelpnow.org.

Fairway Independent Mortgage Co., a mortgage broker/banker with over 100 branches nationwide, has announced a transition from operating as an FHA nonsupervised loan correspondent to a Department of Housing and Urban Development direct endorsement lender.Fairway said the transition enables it to originate and underwrite its own loans, and to increase its Federal Housing Administration originations and get more control of the underwriting process. Fairway had been operating as an FHA nonsupervised loan correspondent, and has been originating FHA loans since its inception in 1996, but until now did not have the power to underwrite these loans. Fairway said it has had a strong quality-control plan in place for the last several years. The company can be found on the Web at http://www.fairwayindependentmc.com.

Redwood Trust, a real estate investment trust specializing in residential and commercial trusts, has deployed Overture's Mozart Tape Cracking 2.0, a software program that enables secondary-market investors to automatically convert complex bulk loan data submitted by primary market lenders into their own formats."We're now able to receive and audit bulk loans from lenders more efficiently and accurately than ever before," said Gary Moore, vice president of information technology for Redwood Trust. "Tape Cracking 2.0 automates a lot of the processes that surround the conversion of nonstandardized data into an investor's own format, making it faster, easier, and more efficient for us to move forward with the evaluation processes." Among the enhancements that distinguish Tape Cracking 2.0 from the original product are an improved ability to manage multiple templates and outputs; a better auditing trail; improved ability to incorporate non-input data; enhanced data mapping capabilities; enhanced cleaning of data errors; and improved error logging.

Lenders First Choice, Simi Valley, Calif., has formed an alliance with Guardian Mortgage Documents, Lakewood, Colo., to offer integrated, one-stop access to LFC's title, closing, appraisal, flood, and credit services and Guardian's mortgage document products and services.The integration will provide access to Guardian's document solutions from within the LFC settlement services platform and enable users to add Guardian documents to any LFC order with one click, the companies said. "Because LFC provides a paperless environment accompanied by workflow management, the integration will not add any processing time, will result in more timely deliveries of all items related to a transaction, and will eliminate training issues when introducing a customer to the [Guardian] solution," the companies said. They can be found online at http://www.lendersfirstchoice.com and http://www.gmd.com.

DRI Management Systems Inc., a provider of default management software based in Newport Beach, Calif., and Artemis Enterprises LLC, Chicago, announced an alliance at the Mortgage Bankers Association convention that offers single-source access to process and information management technology.Mutual clients will gain "substantial cost saving benefits" through time efficiencies and reduction in the risk associated with untimely and inaccurate communication errors, the companies said. "The combination of process and cross-enterprise contact and content data management has never been offered in this industry before," said Mary Hunter, president and chief executive officer of Artemis. The companies can be found on the Web at http://www.dridefault.com and http://www.artemisinfo.com.

Ellie Mae has launched Encompass Banker Edition 3.0, which it says enables mortgage originators to service their own loans and take advantage of broader banking process management and more comprehensive secondary management functionality.The product also enables users to manage the bulk sale of loans in the secondary market while closely tracking overall profitability on trades, Ellie Mae said. Encompass Banker 3.0's additional upgrades, according to the company, include purchase advice reconciliation that enables users to reconcile funds received from investors when selling loans in the secondary market; audit trails that offer a view of changes, including who made each change and when the change was made; and MERS/MIN registration functions that allow users to generate and register MERS/MIN numbers from within Encompass. Enhancements to secondary management functions include integration to a leading product and pricing engine. The company can be found on the Web at http://www.elliemae.com.

Lydian Data Services, a provider of outsourcing services to the mortgage industry based in Jacksonville, Fla., has announced the rollout of a turnkey outsourced fulfillment system targeted at mid-market originators, banks, and credit unions.Aimed at companies entering the wholesale and retail mortgage origination market or looking to convert their fixed-cost operations into a scalable variable-cost model, Lydian's outsourcing services include the entire collaborative Web-based platform, best-practices fulfillment process, and an experienced staff, the company said. They cover the full range of fulfillment and back-office operations, including processing, underwriting, closing, funding, and delivery to core banking and servicing systems, the secondary market, or various investors. Loan status is visible through authorized access via any Internet connection, providing originators a quick and easy view on the up-to-date status of each loan file, Lydian said. The company can be found on the Web at http://www.lydiandata.com.

Lydian Technology Group, a provider of mortgage integration and process automation, has partnered with Intelli-Mine, a provider of business intelligence and mortgage performance management solutions, to enable midmarket lenders to leverage data routinely captured by Lydian's Mortgage Connectivity Hub to better track their company's performance.The Mortgage Connectivity Hub is a software solution that integrates systems, automates processes across disparate applications, and enables real-time user access to companywide data. In essence, the Mortgage Connectivity Hub enables separate software solutions to seamlessly co-exist and collaborate with one another, the companies said. Now, by leveraging the power of Intelli-Mine's dashboards and business intelligence platforms, the Mortgage Connectivity Hub enables users to monitor their own business data. The companies can be found on the Web at http://www.lydiantechnology.com and http://www.intelli-mine.com.

Stewart Information Services Corp., Houston, has announced the release of a system enabling lenders to electronically transmit and display initial disclosure documents to borrowers in "a secure, online, consumer friendly environment."The system also enables lenders to use Stewart's Online Documents Inc. subsidiary as the provider of the disclosure packages, Stewart said. "The new electronic disclosure solution eliminates the need for lenders to print and mail their initial disclosure documents to the borrowers," said Jason Nadeau, senior vice president of e-lender business for PropertyInfo Corp., another Stewart company. The announcement was made at the Mortgage Bankers Association convention in Boston. Stewart can be found on the Web at http://www.stewart.com.