A digital business card, a mortgage payment tool and a mortgage insurance rate finder are among recent mobile applications made available for mortgage professionals. Lenders can look to multiple studies from federal regulators about providing services through mobile devices. Meanwhile, two lenders upgraded existing application capabilities and another developed its own new product.
On Mar. 13, the Federal Trade Commission announced a new video release for mobile app developers. The video offers tips to app creators for producing applications while also maintaining consumer privacy and adhering to truth-in-advertising guidelines.
A few days prior, the FTC issued a report headlining issues facing consumers and businesses in the advent of increased mobile payment services adoption entitled Paper, Plastic…or Mobile? An FTC Workshop on Mobile Payments.
One issue centered around a potential confusing landscape related to financial sources used to fund mobile payments and regulations governing each sources’ different dispute resolution processes for unauthorized or fraudulent charges made through a mobile phone. Other issues concerned security and privacy practices during the mobile payment process and mobile “cramming,” where third parties slip unauthorized charges onto the consumer’s monthly mobile bill.
These FTC concerns echoed the crux of a mid-December Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. media brief that highlighted main points from the Mobile Payments: An Evolving Landscape article. The agency also identified associated risks for users and examined how banks offering these mobile services could ensure regulatory compliance, especially banks using third-party, non-bank providers.
A survey by Ernst Publishing Co. covered mobile technology use in the mortgage lending sector, according to a press release last month. The survey revealed that 80 percent of participants, in their personal lives, used mobile devices daily, while only 17 percent currently used mobile technology to offer at least half of their business services to consumers.
“We’re our own best evidence that consumers want access to mobile tools and yet we’re not making these tools a priority in the way we deal with our customers,” Ernst Publishing Chief Executive Officer and President Gregory Teal said in the release. “This establishes mobile as a significant competitive opportunity for the firms that innovate here.”
In a related arena, j2 Global’s recent white paper claims real estate and mortgage professionals are investing in mobile applications due to current homebuyer needs. Citing a 2012 Forrester Research study on multi-channel home lending, j2 said mobile accessibility is imperative for loan officers working with Generation Y borrowers — those born in the 1980s and 1990s — since 41 percent of borrowers applying for a home-equity loan last year used a digital channel for loan application.
A Feb. 26 JPMorgan Chase & Co. slideshow presentation claimed Chase’s My New Home mobile app, launched late last year, was “critical to capture mortgage customers via mobile/internet” and stated “90 percent of home buyers use the internet in their home search,” a statistic borrowed from the National Association of Realtors’ 2012 Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers.
In related news, a handful of reports dissected consumers’ financial mobile device and app use and addressed specific areas of concern.
The most common mobile banking activities last year were account balance checks, recent transaction surveillance and intra-account money transfers, according to Consumers and Mobile Financial Services 2013, the Federal Reserve Board’s 2012 survey results that measured consumers’ mobile financial services use. The Fed also revealed that as of Nov. 2012, overall consumer mobile banking activity use increased 6 percentage points to 28 percent when compared to December 2011 statistics. Several consumers, however, were still “skeptical” of mobile banking benefits and associated security levels.
Despite the increased usage indicated in the Fed’s report, a Feb. 5 press statement from Varolii Corp. said its survey, which analyzed 600 adults’ mobile banking use, revealed a disconnect between consumer product expectation and bank delivery.
“Today, institutions need to upgrade to the next level by embedding more proactive, rules-based outreach into their application code,” Varolii Chief Financial Executive Officer David McCann’s statement said.
Mobile Apple users gained access to a tool from the Department of Housing and Urban Development for teaching housing industry professionals their responsibilities and borrowers their housing rights, according to a press release earlier this year. The Housing Discrimination Complaint Application, jointly created by HUD’s Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity and Hewlett Packard, also gives borrowers complaint filing capabilities related to housing discrimination and information about the complaint process.
Has the digital age rendered a mortgage professional’s printed business cards obsolete? Mortgage Mapp Founder Ben Brashen thinks so.
An April 30 press statement announced Brashen’s website launch featuring Mortgage Mapp, a customizable mobile application created for mortgage brokers and others to help them better market themselves and their business services. The application is touted as a mobile business card for the digital age that provides consumers with contact information, interactive tools and lead management tools. Available for Apple and Android users, the Mortgage Mapp’s $29.99 price tag and digital features just might relegate printed business cards to entry form status for “free lunch” drawings at local eateries.
In early March, Western Union indicated availability of its Speedpay Mobile Payment App for the mortgage industry and other business sectors in need of a mobile payment option for their consumers. Once Western Union mortgage billing clients implement the program, borrowers can download a client-branded app, available for Apple and Android devices, from client-selected locations and app stores — enabling borrowers to use mobile devices to make house payments and check prior payment data.
From Philadelphia, mortgage insurance provider Radian Guaranty Inc. gave notice, on Jan. 16, that Radian Rates was now available for Android devices. The release of an Apple mobile version of the company’s online M.I. rate finder was reported in September 2012.
Elsewhere, Wells Fargo Mobile, the bank’s mobile banking application, offers borrowers monitoring privileges over their mortgage account activity details, capable through updated versions 2.3 for Android and 2.5 for iPhone. The April 24-modified app also allowed borrowers with Wells bank accounts to execute money transfers for mortgage payments.
Salt Lake City-based Republic Mortgage Home Loans announced, on March 12, a new Apple- and Android-compatible application for its borrowers called My Mortgage App. The application provides Republic borrowers continuous insight into their loan throughout its lifespan.
