With an average of 500 pages per [loan] application, at least two copies of each application, and 10 million applications made in 2014 … the [mortgage] industry consumed at least 10 billion pieces of paper at a cost of more than $60 million. And that’s the least expensive part of the cost of relying on paper records.
According to Fannie Mae, anywhere between 40 percent and 60 percent of the repurchase requests it issues are resolved by simply supplying key documents that were omitted from the loan file when it was originally submitted.
…[But] recent improvements in automated verification technology, e-mortgages and e-signatures, in addition to a growing consumer appetite for online and mobile banking applications, are reducing costs, improving the consumer experience and reducing the risk of loan defects.
This article originally appeared in the September issue of Mortgage Compliance Magazine.
