
Client:
Mortgage Lender Company
Website:
https://www.interfirst.com/
Industry:
Financial Services
Technology and Platforms:
MS Azure Cloud Computing Services, Azure Active Directory, JSON Web Tokens (JWT), Azure OpenAI GPT, Application Performance Monitoring and Alerting (APM), Azure Cognitive Services
IMC wanted to use online processes to automate its loan origination process for borrowers. They wanted fully customizable business flows (i.e., from pre-qualification to loan closure) without the need to involve developers. IMC also the client wanted to create an online dashboard that provides a single channel of communication with borrowers.
The dashboard would provide updates on each step in the loan origination process. Instead of emailing or calling borrowers, loan officers create tasks that are listed in the dashboard for borrowers to act on. In addition, IMC wanted to create an online chat feature for borrowers to add and update information upon request.
1. The loan origination process involved a number of manual steps using pen, paper, US Mail and phone calls. The process was prone to human error and led to longer processing times for loan origination.
2.As some processing moved online, many input forms could not be modified or customized (i.e., for borrowers) without the assistance of developers. The loan approval process required the submission and processing of numerous compliance forms. For each loan,
officers needed the assistance of developers to code these forms statically. This increased the time it took to process each loan.
3.The process of determining lending rates was manual, involving dedicated departments that monitored market rates and performed complex calculations. IMC wanted to ensure that loan origination was profitable for the organization and to retain the borrower as a client.
4.Reviewing loan applications was a manual process for underwriters. They need to review multiple documents and cross-check values across them (e.g., a W2 form and a 1003 form).
“By having product managers working alongside the client, we effectively shared ownership of the product management practices. Forte Group has developed a multi-tenant mortgage SaaS/PaaS platform with end-to-end brokers, realtors, and lenders’ experience support. The all-in-one loan management platform we built has edge lending software features, enabling us to license the technology to other institutions under the CyberDyne brand.”
Max Shulha, Senior Product Owner at Forte Group
The Forte team developed a next-generation, all-in-one loan management platform, which began as a .NET monolith with a React frontend. The Forte team took ownership of Agile development, testing, and release management for three core applications (Loan Application Portal, Communications Chrome Extension, Admin Portal) comprising over 20 business components and modules.
Additionally, the system seamlessly integrates with over 10 third-party services, such as HubSpot, Telnyx, Stripe, HelloSign, Slack, SendBird, and Synthesia. As the client’s business continued to grow, the solution expanded to cover additional areas such as Accounting, Assets, Brokers, Claims, Pricing, Fees, Internal Communications and Customer Communications.
- 50% savings in infrastructure costs
- Cost savings from migrating third-party solutions to in-house solutions: Blend Mortgage Suite, Dropbox Sign, HubSpot, xDoc
- “Quality Guaranteed” approach to releases – multi-layer quality control with intensive test automation and continuous product quality monitoring
- Cloud-ready solution using cloud-based technologies like Azure Function Apps and Azure App Service Plans
- Migration from a monolithic SOA architecture to a microservices architecture to improve development speed, reliability, stability and scalability
- Securing application and infrastructure using industry best practices and standards (e.g., 2FA, JWT, Azure Active Directory)
- Secured end-user applications using JSON Web Tokens (JWT), implemented dynamic claim-based authentication and policy-based authorization
- Commonly-used approach for securing corporate solutions implementation in an organization’s application (Admin Panel CRM) – Single Sign-On (SSO) using Azure Active Directory
- A variety of Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) methods for end-user applications (Apply Form POS, Realtors Portal) implemented, such as authentication via SMS, Email, Magic Link
50% Savings in infrastructure costs
10% Custom business-related service integrations
24/7 Engineering production support
20% Increase in processing speed per single claim