Matt Lowndes, director of innovation at the Mortgage Advice Bureau (MAB), said brokers who don’t use artificial intelligence (AI) will be replaced by those who do.
Speaking at an MIT live event, Lowndes said artificial intelligence will become increasingly useful to brokers and that clients will likely demand it.
“I do believe that brokers who don’t use AI will be replaced by brokers who do.”
Lowndes added that one in three adults now uses AI in some form on a weekly basis to manage their money, with 90% of MAB customers uploading mortgage documents via mobile phone.
“That change is happening,” he said. “It’s here, it’s real now.”
However, Lowndes said MAB brokers are seeing real benefits in using AI to supplement their work.
For example, without AI, the broker’s documentation was about 80% accurate, rising to 99% when the technology was used to help.
“Humanity is still in a cycle,” he said. “AI is not just a supplement. But just as importantly, humans remain at the center of it.”
Similarly, after using AI, MAB’s case handling rate increased by 65% and the complaint settlement rate increased by 164%.
Speaking at the same event, Connect Mortgages CEO Liz Syms said the technology could help the mortgage market in a number of ways, such as building websites and software.
But she added, “If you think of AI as an employee, even if it’s more correct than many employees, you still need to check what that person did.
“If you’re going to put customer information into AI, you have to make sure you have the right systems and the right protocols in place to do it.”
Lendwell co-founder Jamie Lawless said there are three big problems that must be solved for artificial intelligence in the mortgage market.
“These are things where they don’t understand the lender’s specific context, they don’t explain their reasoning and they don’t plug into the advisor workflow.”
