• What's at Stake: Loan officers ability to handle heavier workloads without sacrificing responsiveness to borrowers.
• Expert Quote: "Technology can help identify what fits within published guidelines, but it cannot replace the value of experience" — Marc Halpern, CEO, Foundation Mortgage 

Overview bullets generated by AI with editorial review.   

Mortgage lenders and their technology providers are racing to put artificial intelligence in loan officers' hands, betting it will let originators handle more loans without slowing response times to borrowers.

In recent weeks, non-QM wholesaler Foundation Mortgage launched AskClara, an AI assistant that answers brokers' plain-language questions about products and eligibility. Dark Matter Technologies bought House Numbers' AI agent platform, and nCino rolled out an AI-driven productivity suite for loan officers.

What Foundation Mortgage's AskClara does

Non-qualified mortgage wholesaler Foundation Mortgage has created an artificial intelligence assistant for its mortgage brokers to get product information and more.

The company has named this piece of technology AskClara, and it will give advice in response to plain language questions asked by mortgage broker users. Besides products, AskClara will also return any underwriting criteria, documentation options and potential eligibility.

"One of the biggest challenges brokers face with non-QM lending is understanding the full range of options available for borrowers who don't fit conventional guidelines," said Marc Halpern, CEO of Foundation, in a press release. "Our goal is to help brokers recognize opportunities earlier, ask better questions, and find solutions for more borrowers."

The company pointed out AskClara is a tool to identify potential borrower eligibility based on published program guidelines across various types of non-QM products like debt service coverage ratio, bank statement, asset qualifier, closed end seconds and others, but it will not perform automated underwriting or make credit approvals.

"Technology can help identify what fits within published guidelines, but it cannot replace the value of experience, judgment, and the willingness to take a closer look," Halpern said. Importantly, even if AskClara gives a negative response, it is not Foundation giving the broker a no.

"We want brokers to use the technology to start the conversation, not end it," Halpern said. "That's what common-sense underwriting is all about."

A pair of offerings out of nCino

For third-party originators who use the ICE Mortgage Technology Encompass LOS, nCino has created TPO Experience for its point of sale system.

It will allow Encompass retail originators to use the same platform for their wholesale production, nCino said. Lenders can have brokers submit loans through the same technology their in-house loan officers use.

Brokered loans are assigned to a loan officer at the wholesaler. They are then synced to Encompass with the appropriate channel designation and third-party originators information. It allows the lender's existing business rules to apply for brokered loans.

"Growth in the wholesale channel is putting more pressure on lenders to eliminate the operational divide between their retail and wholesale businesses," said Casey Williams, general manager of global mortgage at nCino in the press release. "TPO Experience gives lending teams a consistent, efficient path to originate loans, no matter how they come in."

The September announcement added nCino plans to expand support to additional LOS systems.

Separately, in October, nCino introduced the Loan Officer Productivity Suite, which it called a comprehensive set of AI-driven tools for mortgage salespersons.

It uses the lender's own data, product guidelines and workflow rules to give originators institution-specific answers.

The suite consists of the following modules:

• Mortgage Advisor for Loan Officers
• Loan PreCheck
• Mortgage MCP for Loan Officers
• AUS Smart Tasks
• Automated Pre-approval
• Automated Disclosures

"Loan officers are being asked to handle more work without sacrificing responsiveness to borrowers," Williams said in this press release. "The Loan Officer Productivity Suite helps create that capacity by taking routine work off originators' plates and putting answers and next steps at their fingertips, so they can stay responsive and competitive without adding more hours to the day."

Dark Matter acquires House Numbers' AI technology

Dark Matter Technologies has purchased House Numbers' platform which creates artificial intelligence agents for home lending workflows. The deal also includes the related intellectual property.

Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

In addition, the team responsible for this technology is joining Dark Matter as part of the deal. It includes House Numbers co-founder and CEO Jeff Levinsohn, who joins Dark Matter as chief AI officer.

Dark Matter had been the origination technology business of Black Knight; it was divested as part of the ICE Mortgage Technology deal. As part of the divestiture, Dark Matter ended up with Aiva. So it already has AI working inside its loan process and this made his team interested in joining forces, Levinsohn said in the press release.

This latest Dark Matter purchase accelerates agentic AI across the Empower loan origination solution and its built-in point of sale technology. The company said it will allow lenders to use autonomous AI agents and AI agent assistants to improve borrower experiences, increase loan officer productivity, lower the cost of origination and advance the shift from doing to reviewing.

"The hard part of agentic AI is not getting a model to do a task once," Levinsohn said. "It is orchestrating complex agentic work safely inside a regulated process and executing valuable tasks consistently at scale, with people in control of the decisions that matter."