Mortgage + Tech + Advice: A better path for homeowners

Today, some mortgage lenders approach home lending as a one-size-fits-all, numbers game. Their objective is to automate the origination of home loans on a large scale, making it easier for homeowners to apply online, which also speeds up the process of selling to investors in loan packages. The problem this creates is a mortgage-lending process focused on the commodity—the mortgage product—and not focused where it should be: real estate decisions with real consequences for home buyers and homeowners.

At Opes Advisors, we are committed to transforming the mortgage lending process by helping people make the most important financial decisions of their lives. Our fundamental belief is that the effective path for homeowners in the mortgage lending process, along with advanced technology, is missing a vital component: financial advice. Uniquely, we have formed our company as a Financial Advisory firm licensed by the SEC as well as state and federal licenses for mortgage banking. Our focus is on each client's total financial picture in the context of this important real estate decision. Our proprietary, Silicon Valley-born real estate decision technology, Opes Advantage, alongside our financial advisors has been helping home buyers and homeowners for the last ten years to make smarter purchasing decisions by modeling how life's major decisions can impact one's financial future.

The old way is not always the best way

We've all been told that if you shop for rates and lenders and then click a few buttons on your device – you should magically get a mortgage. If it really is that simple, then why do so many people live with uncertainty about how real estate financing will affect their financial future?

In our view, the role of a mortgage firm should be to help clients fully understand how the decision to buy or sell a home can completely alter their financial situation and have long-term consequences well into their future. Other lenders can tell people how much they will loan them, but at Opes Advisors, we not only provide that service, but we show how each lending scenario affects them personally against their goals and ambitions for the future.

Factoring in the mortgage

Before Opes Advisors, no financial services firm was equipped to offer financial advice at the point of sale on the real estate buying and mortgage lending process. There simply were no firms advising people about how this real estate buying decision fits into their entire financial life. Opes Advisors is more than just one of the Top 25 largest mortgage banks in the U.S. We are an innovative financial advisory firm, one based on trust and on the surprisingly groundbreaking notion that you need to consider your total financial picture whenever you make a major financial decision, especially when buying your home and financing that purchase.

Technology to understand the "What ifs"

By using Opes Advantage, our clients can easily visualize how this real estate purchase changes their entire financial picture for any period of time in their lives. Opes Advantage creates a personal model of their financial life so a client sees their future through a variety of "what if" scenarios. What happens when they want children? Or later have two kids going to college at the same time? What if both spouses are working and then one chooses to stay home? How do variable bonuses change their personal financial picture? Any ambition or concern can be modeled specifically to their situation.

The missing piece of the buying decision and mortgage puzzle is Opes Advantage; and we take into account all of these variables – and more – from the cost of raising children and income projections to inflation and taxes. So many factors impact one's financial future. We want home buyers and homeowners who get a mortgage to actually see how these decisions impact their financial future. That's what Opes Advantage can do: it gives people a complete view into their financial future by taking into account all the complexities across a wide range of life events.

Expertise is crucial

Because buying a home is one of the largest financial decisions most people will ever make, more than technology is needed to factor in each family's unique concerns and explain the resulting impact on their financial future. That's why combining advanced technology with deep subject matter expertise is so crucial. Opes Advisors is the only mortgage lender that adds the financial advice component. This approach is more effective because it helps people envision their decisions and removes uncertainty from the process so they can move forward with confidence.

The mortgage lending process will continue to undergo disruption as the industry focuses on mortgage as a commodity, yet this path provides home buyers and home owners with no new help on important real estate decisions. Mortgage lending can be more than just the mortgage product. Mortgage lenders will need to offer all three things to adapt to the future: the right mortgage product, advanced technology and sound financial advice. This is the approach that will offer clients a more secure future than just pressing a button.

To learn more about Opes Advisors, visit opesadvisors.com.