Hometrack improves decisioning for mortgage process

The proposition defines four new product suites, and launches four new products, building upon Hometrack’s Automated Valuation Model (AVM).

Hometrack improves decisioning for mortgage process

Hometrack has improved its mortgage decisioning for lenders, brokers and borrowers by amending its strategy to digitise the mortgage journey with automated valuation, property risk and income verification.

The proposition defines four new product suites, and launches four new products, building upon Hometrack’s Automated Valuation Model (AVM).

The product suites are Valuation Solutions, which is designed to inform lenders and brokers instantly at origination, or for an entire portfolio, what a property is worth with confidence using data and analytics.

Automation Solutions connects lenders, brokers and conveyancers across the entire mortgage journey and automating risk decisions and significantly reducing time from application to offer.

Hometrack also revealed that Risk Insight informs lenders instantly during mortgage origination or for their entire portfolio what property risks exist and what the impact could be on capital valuation, all the while keeping compliant with regulation.

And Opportunity Insight provides valuable data and greater insight about the property market today and where it is headed.

Looking to the product suites, the new products are Digital Valuer, which sits under Valuation Solutions and provides a digital solution that offers property valuations, extending Hometrack’s automated valuation capabilities and property risk assessments.

Broker AVM also sits under Valuation Solutions and allows for a ‘right first time’ product selection specific to brokers and their customers seamlessly within the Broker Platform.

It provides a property valuation, monthly rental and property attribute data with confidence bandings, the Broker AVM uses Hometrack’s AVM model to return valuations tailored for brokers without the precise confidence levels that lenders require.

Credit Risk Hub sits under Automation Solutions and automates credit risk decisions, with specific emphasis on instant income and expenditure verification, by combining automated verification of borrower documentation and soon to extend to open banking.

The solution automatically scans, reviews and verifies key applicant details around income and expenditure, fully automating 50% plus of applications and reducing effort by 75% on the rest.

And Climate Change Risk which sits within Risk Insight is fuelled by data and insights from Ambiental and Terrafirma on flood, coastal erosion and ground risk, and arms lenders with increased understanding of the impact of climate change on their portfolios and during origination.

According to Hometrack, this allows them to be focused on actively managing their climate change risk aligned to their risk appetite.

It also enables them to take greater control of the threat of climate change - an accelerating regulatory issue across lender portfolios.

Spencer Wyer, VP of product and technology at Hometrack, said: “Today's launch marks a new milestone for the millions of mortgage journeys undertaken by lenders, brokers and borrowers each year.

"Unlocking opportunities for the mortgage industry, it improves Hometrack’s offering to lenders and brokers, enabling them to embrace digital mortgage lending more quickly and easily.

"The powerful combination of Digital Valuer, Broker AVM, Credit Risk Hub and Climate Change Risk offers instant automated decisions and access to a wealth of data and analysis to significantly reduce the time from application to offer.”

"This launch is game changing for the industry, the positive impact that we expect this to have on brokers and lenders will alter the space permanently."

Wyer also explained that the launch is designed to help brokers and lenders looking at the wider proposition and support them through the process.

George Robbins, VP commercial at Hometrack, added: “We’ve seen a huge demand for our trusted, integrated lending solutions from UK lenders, and I’m proud to say that in just seven months our new Climate Change Risk product has already been used widely to assess more than a quarter of UK mortgages."

Robbins also explained that the mortgage sector as a whole is under digitalised, which is something this launch is designed to improve, he said.

He added: "Over the last 24 to 30 months we have been building our product set. 70% to 80% of mortgages are brought through by brokers and therefore we wanted to increase their options within the mortgage process and improve it overall for them.

"Climate change is a key area which we felt needed support and improvement, which is why we have designed our Climate Change Risk suite.

"Overall, we wanted to smooth out the entire process for brokers and lenders alike and therefore improve the journey for the customers as well."