Figure now using OpenAI’s GPT to speed HELOC doc review process

By Matt Carter

When combined with a newly launched chatbot powered by Google Gemini, Figure says AI-powered doc review to save $8M while raising customer satisfaction scores

Home equity line of credit giant Figure says it tapped 1.7 million pages of originations data spanning six years to train an AI document review tool that’s cut manual upfront document review labor by 93 percent while raising customer satisfaction scores.

Figure says the AI tool, powered by OpenAI’s GPT, largely does away with the need for humans to perform tedious “stare and compare” document reviews on applications for home equity lines of credit (HELOCs).

Based in New York, Figure Technology Solutions claims its Figure Lending subsidiary is the largest non-bank provider of HELOCs, and that its software has been used to originate more than $11 billion in loans.

Figure Lending offers HELOCs both directly to consumers and through more than 120 lending partners that account for more than 60 percent of its originations, including CMG Financial, CrossCountry Mortgage, Fairway Independent Mortgage, The Loan Store, Movement Mortgage, Rate and Synergy One.

“We consider our AI our lending partners’ AI, so we designed it with them in mind – for their own funnels, processes, and customers,” Figure CEO Michael Tannenbaum said in statement Monday. “Bigger picture, by lowering loan processing costs, we’re lowering our product costs and thereby housing costs broadly.”

Figure said its AI-powered document review process, when combined with a newly launched chatbot powered with Google Gemini, is expected to save more than $8 million in costs, and has helped it raise its Net Promoter Score (NPS) to 80 “a two-point increase from an already exceptional 78.”

Mortgage lenders and servicers have embraced AI as a tool to cut costs and scale efficiently in what can be a boom-and-bust business.

When mortgage rates came down to historic lows during the pandemic, many lenders found it challenging to keep up with the demand for refinancing.

With mortgage rates on the decline again this year, Rocket Mortgage says its investments in AI have cut turn times by 25 percent and will help it rapidly scale its business if mortgage lending rebounds.

Loan servicing giant Mr. Cooper, which collects monthly payments on more than $1 trillion in mortgages, spends several hundred million dollars a year on call center operations and expects at least $50 in annual savings from its investment in a multiyear AI project.

For companies that don’t have the resources to develop such tools in-house, Simplist Technologies offers Sonar, an AI-powered solution integrating loan origination software, point of sale software, a product pricing engine (PPE) and customer relationship management.

TidalWave.ai, a mortgage technology provider headed by former Better Chief Technology Officer Diane Yu, also uses AI to streamline the mortgage process. TidalWave’s AI-powered residential mortgage engine, SOLO, is now integrated with Fannie Mae’s Desktop Underwriter and Freddie Mac’s Loan Product Advisor.

Mortgage capital markets technology provider Polly is embedding AI within its PPE, enabling tools like an “interactive copilot for loan officers” the company says “taps into the PPE’s unrivaled depth to process, interpret, and recommend a range of outcome-driven results.”

Mortgage technology provider Maxwell now offers an AI-powered business intelligence tool for lenders that allows them to make database queries in plain English.

The Original Press Release