At the L1 Summit, technology is obviously a key segment of many sessions. Tech is helping larger companies in their moves in controlling the borrower funnel. Artificial intelligence (AI) with its pros and cons but hoped-for benefits to productivity and therefore cost reduction, is a common conversation topic. Third party provider offerings are also theme. especially when it comes to technology and marketing. “Rob, I know that you have job ads in your Commentary, but we’re loo

We do not have the right to criticize this industry if we are unwilling to invest in improving it. Not in private conversations. Not in conference hallways. Not in boardrooms. If we benefit from the infrastructure of mortgage banking, from its standards, its frameworks, its collective trust, then we carry a responsibility to help sustain it. I earned my Certified Mortgage Banker (CMB) designation in 2005. The CMB is not simply a credential. It is a professional standard recog

I came across a piece in National Mortgage Professional  last week about Zillow partnering with Google to integrate its home-buying content into NotebookLM. This move builds on Zillow’s upstream strategy after integrating with ChatGPT  at the end of 2025. If you have not played with NotebookLM yet, it is Google’s AI research tool. You give it sources and it becomes an expert on those sources. Zillow is now feeding it its home-buying content library. Guides on preapproval, aff

Here in New Orleans, the average rainfall is about 5 feet a year, much of it in the summer. Out west, most snow and rain occur in the winter. I mention this because, although being hit by a storm now including a deadly avalanche, until recently the Western U.S. was in a dire snow drought. What comes next is even scarier. Does the climate, and its impact on weather, impact lenders and servicers? Of course it does. But then again, in my 40+ years in capital markets, I’ve seen

Studying the mortgage industry for over 35 years, I’ve learned: the winners don’t just think better. They move faster. We talk a lot about rates, inventory, consolidation, and AI. All important. But none of it matters if you’re slow to act. Speed is no longer a tactic. It’s a discipline. Consumer direct channels figured this out years ago with one simple concept: speed to lead. The data is overwhelming. The faster you respond to an inquiry, the higher your conversion rate. Mi

Two weeks ago, we talked about "vibe coding" as a mindset shift for loan officers. Not learning to code. Not becoming a software company. Simply using modern AI tools to turn plain-English ideas into live, useful resources faster than traditional marketing workflows allow. This week, I want to make it tangible. I built a live consumer-facing page using nothing more than an AI assistant and our CRM. No developer. No design sprint. No long intake process. The goal wasn't to cre

Our meat prices have gone up… Cattle herd numbers at a 75-year low. There ain’t nothing Jerome Powell or the Fed can do about drought and high grain prices. To deal with rising operating costs, many U.S. cattle farmers reduced the size of their herds, and some got out of the business altogether. As a result, the U.S. cattle inventory is the smallest it’s been since 1951. Regarding rate movement, the bond markets often do the Fed’s job for it, and so whatever the Fed’s Open Ma

There’s a reason conversations about the Innovation Investment Fee (IIF) often start with confusion rather than conviction. One of the most common, and most honest, things I hear from executives is this: “I don’t really understand what MISMO does, let alone why I should care enough to pay.”  That observation sits at the root of the challenge. When standards work well, they’re invisible. They don’t show up in sales meetings or earnings calls. They don’t have a logo on the borr

Here in Northern Nevada, as well as places like Alaska and California, mining for precious metals occupies a good chunk of history. Early miners, and Yukon Cornelius , would be stunned at how investors and speculators have flocked to silver and gold, and how the U.S. dollar has declined in value. Put another way, it takes many more dollars now to equal the value of an ounce of gold. When other countries have seen their currency devalued for various reasons, it typically does

Mortgage marketing has turned into a speed game. In a purchase market, the advantage goes to the loan officer who can ship helpful things fast. The LOs winning attention are not always the ones with the biggest budgets. They are the ones who can launch something useful quickly, test it in the real world, and improve it without waiting on a vendor queue. That is where “vibe coding” comes in. The label is new, but the idea is simple: you describe what you want in plain English,

While “Sell America” goes on, or at least the perception of it, outside our borders, leading to bond prices going down and rates going up, in this country we are learning the difference between a pardon, a commutation, and clemency. I continue to hear how fraud, especially occupancy fraud, in residential lending is on the upswing. President Donald Trump commuted the five-year prison sentence (freed, but conviction stands) of a New York real estate manager convicted of fraudul

For consumers paying attention to housing news lately, it probably feels like the industry and policymakers are throwing everything they have at the affordability problem. 50-year amortization mortgages. Penalty-free access to 401(k) funds for down payments. Prepayment penalties reintroduced as a way to lower interest rates. And now, proposals from the White House to ban large investors from purchasing homes. Each of these ideas has made headlines over the last several months

Last week, Donald Trump floated a proposal that immediately grabbed headlines: a one-year federal cap on credit card interest rates at 10%. Markets reacted quickly. Bank stocks sold off. Trade groups pushed back. And the debate over consumer affordability versus credit availability reignited almost overnight.(Source: CNBC – https://www.cnbc.com/2026/01/10/trump-calls-for-one-year-cap-on-credit-card-interest-rates-at-10percent.html ) At first glance, this looks like a story sq

As we prepare to enter a new year, and a new era defined by artificial intelligence, interoperability, and accelerating change, it’s a privilege to welcome the 2026 MISMO Board of Directors . This Board reflects the depth, diversity, and leadership required at a pivotal moment for our industry. MISMO exists by the industry and for the industry . Its work quietly supports every loan, every day, across origination, servicing, capital markets, and the technology ecosystem that b

How many people live in the United States, and the world? Here you go , as accurately as you’re going to see anywhere. Loan originators are acutely aware of demographics (“know your borrower,” right?). Naming generations is relatively recent, and then-People Magazine Editor Landon Y. Jones coined the term Baby Boomer. (He died last year.) The oldest Baby Boomers turn 80 in 2026. By the end of this decade, all baby boomers will be 65 and older , and the number of people 80 and

Will rates impact the latest MBA origination forecast of $2.2 trillion next year? Sure, although… The Federal Reserve has cut overnight rates, but longer-term rates (like 15- and 30-year mortgages) have done little or have gone up. Recently news came out that Freddie and Fannie are buying securities that they produce. If GM is buying its own cars, should its stock price go up, or does the price of its cars go up? Do GSE MBS purchases really move rates? The recent news that t

If you spent 2025 waiting for the market to “come roaring back,” you probably left disappointed. This was not 2020 or 2021. It also was not 2022’s hangover. But it was not the free-fall mood of 2023, either. 2025 was the year the industry proved it can operate in a normal-rate environment, even if “normal” now means a 30-year fixed that starts with a 6. As of last week, Freddie Mac had the average 30-year fixed at 6.21% . ( AP News ) The market did not need a miracle to impro

Then UAD 3.6 Should Already Be on Your Agenda. Do you want more appraisal waivers? Do you want appraisals completed faster, with better accuracy and quality? Do you want less liability and risk tied to appraisal data flowing through your organization? It’s hard to imagine anyone in mortgage answering “no” to any of those questions. And yet, many lenders are still treating the Uniform Appraisal Dataset (UAD) 3.6 as something to deal with later. A future compliance task. A dist

In HousingWire, Flávia Furlan Nunes described what originators have been feeling in their P&Ls: the math on credit reporting is breaking. Credit report prices have been rising sharply, and resellers are signaling as much as another 50 percent increase in 2026, which would mark the fourth straight year of higher costs. That spike lands on top of an already expensive production base. Freddie Mac’s latest Cost to Originate study, reported by National Mortgage Professional, shows

Both Dick Van Dyke and Mel Brooks turn 100, Dick in less than two weeks and Mel next summer. 100 years is a long time, and it’s a big number. Despite faster economic growth than peers, the U.S. faces rising deficits and debt levels above 100 percent of GDP . If this impacts our debt ratings further, look out. Political gridlock and reluctance to enact meaningful tax increases or spending cuts echo challenges seen in the UK and France, where governments struggle to satisfy vot