Our team just returned from the TMC Summer Conference last week. Capacity sent six teammates, including myself, to the Terranea Resort in Rancho Palos Verdes, California. As a new team member of Capacity, this was my first conference representing the company. The peer-to-peer conversations were refreshing, and the sessions were insightful.
Capacity has been a member of The Mortgage Collaborative since 2019. I started working with Capacity in March of this year, and I’ve heard many amazing things about the relationship between Capacity and TMC, so it was great to get out of our day-to-day Zoom calls and put faces to names.
Before I dive into the insights from the conference, I have to congratulate TMC for hosting a wonderful conference. The app, Whoova, that TMC encouraged attendees to use was a helpful resource in building out an ideal calendar, getting updates on sessions, connecting with other attendees, and improving attendee interest as a whole. And the resort itself was beautiful. I believe all attendees enjoyed the ability to walk the property, have dinners, do yoga, take hikes, and take meetings in a beautiful landscape rather than conference rooms. A wonderful way to kick off in-person events again!
Conference Sessions.
There were a ton of great sessions and panels available to attend. Unfortunately, I couldn’t attend them all. The following are those that stuck out to me the most.
The State of the Mortgage Industry: Assessing the Last 18 Months’ Trends.
This panel featured industry powerhouses, including Sarah Gonzalez, COO at First Guaranty Mortgage Corporation; Jodi Hall, President at Nationwide Mortgage Bankers; Rob Chrisman, Capital Markets Consultant; and Kirk Willison, VP of Government and Industry Relations at Arch Mortgage Insurance Company. During the panel, they discussed the importance of technology for stagnant processes. They also shared the belief that the next 3 years are likely to have a heightened volume of loan origination. This is important for lenders who currently don’t have the technology to assist with an influx of loans.
Another trend that stood out to me and is worth a mention is the increase in minority homeownership. This was something that I briefly was aware of before attending the conference. I listen to the Market Mondays, Earn Your Leisure podcast, where they focus on sharing the opportunity for financial literacy. This particular episode spoke about homeownership and featured an Atlanta real estate agent, Quiana Watson. She shared that larger cities have more opportunities to build new construction and capitalize on what’s already there, including diverse and minority communities. There are a lot of opportunities to flip houses in hubs like Atlanta, GA; Charlotte, NC; Chicago, IL; Houston, TX; and Miami, FL. Hearing Jodi provide her point of view and mention this area for opportunity was exciting and encouraging.
The Lightning Showcase.
These sessions are always my favorite, maybe I am biased because I am in sales, but 8 minutes to give your pitch and make an impact keeps the energy buzzing after a full day of networking. I enjoyed hearing how vendors spoke about their product as well as the client testimonials of customers who took the stage. I learned a lot about the vendors in the space, what kind of ROI can be achieved, and common results.
During Capacity’s showcase, Tim Yeadon, CRO at Capacity, and Kevin Peranio, Chief Loan Officer at PRMG, took the stage. This session was near and dear to my heart since I have the privilege of working hands-on with the PRMG team. Kevin highlighted how he felt about the relationship between PRMG and Capacity, and shared all that PRMG has accomplished through the partnership. I could tell that a lot of attendees were drawn in and engaged. After our session, I had the potential to discuss the benefits of Capacity’s internal bot with attendees. It turns out that not many companies think about the value that comes with internal support for employee questions and support.
A few other showcases that stood out to me included Sales Boomerang’s showcase. The electric guitar intros and outros were very entertaining. Plaza Home Mortgage discussed the topic of renovation loans, which caught my attention because it’s a new trend among millennials and I too hope to be a new homeowner soon. 🙂
David’s whiteboard session.
During this session, David Karandish, CEO of Capacity, provided an overview of the tech landscape. He discussed where we currently exist and how we can continue moving forward. He shared how Capacity is weaved in between two existing markets today, the system of record and system of engagement layer, as a system of intelligence; which enables alignment, communication, interactions across all tech in a mortgage stack. One point that I believe resonated with the audience was his stance on product engineering and how it has evolved and will continue to do so. Lenders can’t rely on a single point solution, anymore. They need a platform that can be agnostic and connect to all the places that provide value.
Beyond the sessions and in-person conversations, attending the TMC Summer Conference exposed me to multiple personas in the mortgage industry. Coming from outside of the industry, this was a wonderful event for me to gather intel on the different challenges, bottlenecks, and focus areas for support automation as well as have quality conversations from some of the best in the biz. Examples include post-close process vs. LO efficiency and lifting the burden off of underwriting. I appreciated getting in the know about the industry’s problems and learning where Capacity’s support automation platform can step in. Can’t wait for the next one!