Brokers that do not use artificial intelligence (AI) will be replaced by those that do, according to Mortgage Advice Bureau (MAB) innovation director Matt Lowndes.

Speaking at the MIT Live event, Lowndes said that AI will become increasingly useful for brokers, and that customers will likely demand it.

“I do believe that brokers that don’t use AI will be replaced by brokers that do use AI.”

Lowndes added that one third of adults now use AI in some form to manage their money every week, and 90% of MAB customers upload mortgage documents from their mobile phones.

“That change is happening,” he said. “It’s here, it is real now.”

However, Lowndes said MAB brokers were finding real benefits from using AI to supplement their work.

For example, broker accuracy with documentation was around 80% without AI, rising to 99% when the technology was used to help.

“The human is still in the loop,” he said. “AI is not just a bolt-on. But it’s also really important that the human is still smack bang in the centre of it.”

Likewise, MAB has seen a 65% improvement in case handling and a 164% increase in complaint closures when using AI.

Speaking at the same event, Connect Mortgages chief executive Liz Syms said there were many ways the technology could be used to help the mortgage market, such as by building websites and software.

But she added a note of caution, saying: “If you think about AI as an employee, even if it gets it right more than many employees, you will still need to check what that person has done.

“If you are going to put customer information into AI, you have to make sure you have the right system with the right agreement to do that.”

Lendwell co-founder Jamie Lawless said there were three big problems with AI in the mortgage market that must be navigated.

“These are that they do not understand lender-specific context, they do not explain their reasoning and they do not plug into adviser workflows.”