Technology

LoopNet, an online commercial real estate marketplace, has filed a registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission for a proposed initial public offering of its common stock.The San Francisco-based company said the number of shares to be offered and the price range have not yet been determined. LoopNet enables commercial real estate brokers, and other agents, to list properties for sale or lease. In addition, the company provides technology and information services to enable commercial real estate organizations to manage their online listings and property marketing. The company can be found on the Web at http://www.loopnet.com.

The Property Records Industry Association and the Mortgage Industry Standards Maintenance Organization have announced what they termed a "landmark alliance" that creates a seamless "plug and play" between PRIA and MISMO standards to streamline the property recordation process.PRIA president Mark Monacelli said the alliance marries his organization's recording standard with MISMO's closing standards. MISMO president Doug Duncan, chief economist of the Mortgage Bankers Association, said "systemic changes" in the capital markets increase the need for efficient data interchange. "This alliance with PRIA spans both the commercial and residential industries and will provide both sectors with the framework for the efficient electronic delivery of public property records," Mr. Duncan said. MISMO, which was created by the MBA in 1999, is the standards development body for the real estate finance industry. PRIA and MISMO can be found online at http://www.pria.us and http://www.mismo.org.

At their 2006 Summit in Las Vegas John Bryant, SVP of banking at Wolters Kluwer Financial Services, said that banking is one of two growth areas for the company this year, with the mortgage space being the most profitable division within the banking umbrella.In 2005 the WKFS brand was introduced, the company integrated its back-office operations, acquired doc prep vendor Entyre, launched new products such as SMART Doc delivery to Freddie Mac and a bilingual initiative, and adopted a Six Sigma approach. In 2006 Mr. Bryant shared three goals: first, the company intends to continue to invest in its existing brands; second, WKFS plans to increase its mortgage technology portfolio by embarking on several acquisitions and strategic partnerships; and lastly, WKFS will integrate its systems to allow for a more seamless environment to allow for more cross selling opportunities.

Horsham, Pa.-based GMAC Bank's wholesale lending unit launched a Web application called Get Scenario, available to its broker and correspondent customers, which enables users to enter loan level data attributes and almost instantly receive a list of eligible products for sale through GMAC Bank.Get Scenario was also designed for enhanced ease and efficiency in the loan registration process. First, GMAC Bank correspondents and brokers login to http://www.gmacbankwholesale.com. Second, users enter a few pieces of their customer's loan information, and a requested final rate or final price. From there, the Get Scenario application will provide a list of eligible products, which users can click on to get more information. Users then click on the price and are provided detailed pricing and loan attribute detail. Further, if GMAC Bank customers are not sure if the recommended product is the best option for their borrowers, they can alter the data and view another potential set of products. Lastly, when users find the product for their borrower they are most satisfied with, they can register and lock the loan directly from the application.

Interthinx, a provider of fraud prevention and decision support tools for the mortgage industry based in Calabasas, Calif., has integrated its fraud prevention systems with VueCentric’s loan origination system, Mortgage Dashboard.This partnership enables VueCentric to offer customers a seamless integration with Interthinx for automatic screening for potential fraudulent activity. Specifically, VueCentric integrated Interthinx’s DISSCO product, an electronic fraud prevention tool. Also, the interface includes Interthinx’s PredProtect, an anti-predatory solution that scores loan data elements against all predatory lending laws currently in effect, and HCLSM, a Web-based tool that scores loans in real time for federal, state and local conditions to identify high cost. The companies can be found on the Web at http://www.interthinx.com and http://www.vuecentric.com.

Sacramento-based CoreLogic has adapted its HistoryPro application to help speed up insurance claims posted by victims of Katrina and Rita.In recent months, Gulf Coast homeowners have filed some 239,000 flood insurance claims from hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and the estimated $23 billion that is to be paid through the National Flood Insurance Program greatly exceeds its yearly premium collections of $2 billion. Faced with this situation, mortgage lenders needed a unified approach to gathering data to access their loan reserves and respond to the Housing Policy Council’s need for data. In response, CoreLogic, a provider of mortgage risk assessment and fraud prevention solutions, has developed a program that analyzes the appropriate data and displays it visually utilizing geographic information systems. Lenders provide property address information for potentially impacted properties, which is then run through CoreLogic’s HistoryPro collateral evaluation tool. The data stream is geographically coded from there to create an exact location on a map and overlay any known boundary condition such as FEMA disaster zones, flood levels, storm surge, etc. and is returned by CoreLogic to the lender and the HPC. The company can be found on the Web at http://www.corelogic.com.

The Mortgage Industry Standards Maintenance Organization, a not-for-profit subsidiary of the Mortgage Bankers Association, has released its first data standard for the commercial/multifamily mortgage industry.The release of version 1.0 of the Commercial Servicing Transfer Standard is the first of many planned for the industry, MISMO said. It was chosen to be MISMO's first commercial standard "because it answers the industry's need for a standardized way to move large amounts of data and improve what is currently a labor-intensive process," the organization said. MISMO said its data standards will ultimately "reduce costs, streamline processes, improve accuracy, increase data transparency, and boost investor confidence in mortgages as an asset class." MISMO can be found online at http://www.mismo.org.

Fannie Mae and Thomson TradeWeb, a fixed-income trading network based in Orlando, Fla., have announced the introduction of technology that will enable institutional investors to directly access and trade Fannie Mae's Discount Notes online through authorized dealers.Robert Dolecki, director of short-term funding at Fannie Mae, said the move offers investors a "significantly easier" way to view and trade the government-sponsored enterprise's Discount Notes. "Additionally, the technology will increase the liquidity and transparency of our short-term securities," Mr. Dolecki said. The companies can be found online at http://www.fanniemae.com and http://www.tradeweb.com.

Arlington Capital Mortgage Corp., Bensalem, Pa., has picked Archive Systems' ASPEN 360 Software-as-a-Service system to create a central repository to give its branches online access to loan documents.The SaaS system means Arlington will require no software, hardware, or infrastructure to use the system. Arlington Capital personnel will scan and upload loan documents via ASPEN 360's Scanning Gateway technology. Arlington will also use the system to provide direct access to investors looking to purchase loans. Fairfield, N.J.-based Archive Systems provides DPO (document process outsourcing) services. The companies can be found online at http://www.thinkarlington.com/ac and http://www.archivesystems.com.

ANTs Software Inc., Burlingame, Calif., has announced the launch of the SFG Bancorp system, which offers to reduce a one- to three-day loan application process to a single 22-minute phone call.SFG, a real estate brokerage and direct mortgage lender based in Pleasanton, Calif., has adopted the ANTs data server to create an integrated mortgage lending system the company touts as slashing the total cost of ownership by 90% compared with that of competing systems. The ANTs Data Server 3.4 serves as the central repository for all customer data. ANTs partnered with sfaFinity Inc., San Jose, Calif., to integrate its customer relationship management capabilities with the ANTs Data Server. SFG Bancorp's resulting SWEEP system is projected to support 1,200 simultaneous users (local or remote via the Internet) and 90 million database records by the end of 2006. The companies can be found online at http://www.ants.com, http://www.sfgbancorp.com/content.aspx, and http://www.sfafinity.com.