[00:00] In warehouse lending execution practices, speed to market drives choices that warehouse customers make every single day. Manual touches will always slow down the process. The slower times in the industry allow for retooling and reimagining what the process looks like. Not just how it will process today’s volume, but how it will maintain control, visibility, and the service level when the market moves.
[00:22] Matt Saxon: Welcome to MPA TV, where we bring industry leaders in to discuss topics that matter to mortgage professionals. I’m Matt Saxon, mortgage journalist here at Mortgage Professional America. Today our topic is the liquidity readiness playbook, helping warehouse lenders prepare for the next market shift. To discuss this topic, I’m grateful to be joined on this edition by Tenielle Hammett, senior vice president warehouse administration services at SitusAMC. Tenielle, thank you so much for joining us on this edition of MPA TV.
[00:49] Tenielle Hammett: Hey Matt, happy to be here. Thank you.
[00:51] Matt Saxon: Let’s dive right in. It’s an interesting time, obviously, in the industry as warehouse lenders prepare for changing market conditions. How important is real-time visibility into facility performance, collateral movement, and operational bottlenecks? And how can tools like Promerit’s new monitoring dashboard help lenders spot issues earlier and make faster, more confident decisions?
[01:12] Tenielle Hammett: You know, real-time visibility is paramount in warehouse lending execution practices. Speed to market drives choices that warehouse customers make every single day. Warehouse borrowers can move their business to another lender who may be faster to provide a critical Fed reference number, ship their collateral, or be hit with a loan from the facility. In a market where warehouse execution can be a differentiator, visibility is not just an operational benefit. It helps lenders protect their relationships, identify bottlenecks before they affect clients, and keep liquidity moving.
[01:42] We do have a new functionality in our Promerit system. Our monitoring dashboard is now available in Promerit and provides the most up-to-date information on any individual relationship or all of them at once. By highlighting pending deliveries, loan level errors, and transactions that may be sitting too long in a workflow status, the dashboard gives teams the information they need to act sooner, reduce delays, and improve execution.
[02:07] Matt Saxon: Obviously there’s a lot of organizations out there looking to make some changes right now. For organizations looking to launch, expand, or modernize a warehouse lending program, what are some of the most important configuration decisions they need to get right up front? How can warehouse configuration services help lenders build a stronger foundation around workflows, controls, reporting, counterparties, and even scalability?
[02:29] Tenielle Hammett: You know, strong configuration up front helps lenders avoid rebuilding workflows later, especially as they add counterparties, asset types, or reporting requirements that are specific to each facility control.
[02:41] Expanding capacity without increasing resources requires some level of automation to be introduced to the process. Define requirements, considering your downstream impacts, identifying an acceptable outcome, and maintaining compliance and risk controls.
[02:56] Our warehouse configuration services team has recently successfully implemented straight-through processing automations where clean file submissions are processed nearly instantly.
[03:05] We aligned the margin call process with automation and accuracy. We’ve also automated reporting to warehouse lenders and their clients so users on each level are doing less clicking through the system to get information they care about. And again, the ease of use and speed to market are choices that customers make every day with each loan submission.
[03:25] Matt Saxon: When things speed up fast, like there’s a sudden jump in volume, what tends to be the first thing that slows a warehouse lender down and what can they do ahead of time so that doesn’t happen?
[03:35] Tenielle Hammett: You know, the industry experiences this bump in volume every spring when buyers start looking for new homes or they apply for a cash-out refinance for home renovations over the summer months. So, even if the market recovery is gradual, lenders should expect pockets of activity whether from purchase seasonality, cash-out refis, or home equity demand. And the firms that prepared during the slower periods will be in a position when volume rises.
[03:59] So, manual touches will always slow down the process. The slower times in the industry allow for retooling and reimagining what the process looks like. This is when you can think about enhancements to or reductions in your requirements where you can introduce these workflows and automations. You can really take a look under the hood of the operational processes and find improvements that may be available and still meet bank and regulatory requirements. Our warehouse administration and configuration services team also provides consulting services for our clients, whether you’re new or existing.
[04:31] Matt Saxon: Warehouse lenders are juggling a lot of moving pieces, validating funding requests, reconciling cash, pulling in data from loan origination and other systems. Where do you see the biggest opportunity to make that whole process smoother?
[04:44] Tenielle Hammett: You know, the largest opportunity to make smoother process has many answers and many more dependencies. Warehouse lending is a very complex business and many moving parts. So, the biggest opportunity is usually reducing handoffs between funding validation, collateral movement, cash reconciliation, system data, and reporting.
[05:02] So, when those pieces are connected through a common process and a platform, teams spend less time chasing status and more time managing exceptions. My recommendation and plug, if I’m being honest, is for banks and warehouse lenders to focus on what they do best. They gain new business and service their existing clients and they partner with experts like SitusAMC for technology and operational services.
[05:24] Matt Saxon: Always works out best if everybody does the things they do best. That makes it a much smoother process for everybody.
[05:30] Tenielle Hammett: The things they do best. That’s right.
[05:32] Matt Saxon: If you had to tell me what being ready really means for a warehouse lender versus a company that just thinks it’s ready, what’s really the difference there?
[05:41] Tenielle Hammett: That’s a great final question. I have been in warehouse lending over 25 years and have had exposure to many warehouse lender operations. I’ve experienced new and existing lenders’ onboarding process and their continued challenges and things that work best. My definition of ready really boils down to their requirements. The difference of being ready is in the details.
[05:57] The lender who knows the loan level eligibility parameters with a well-defined data model, they prioritize automations and understand the reporting requirements and downstream impacts is in a stronger position.
[06:09] A warehouse lender that is truly ready has already defined how it will scale. Not just how it will process today’s volume, but how it will maintain control, visibility, and the service level when the market moves.
[06:22] Matt Saxon: I’ve enjoyed our conversation today. A lot of really interesting stuff. But before we wrap up, I just wanted to see if you had any final thoughts on the topic because it is something that I think is on a lot of people’s minds especially right now.
[06:33] Tenielle Hammett: As our warehouse configuration services and warehouse administration service offerings continue to evolve, we want to maintain flexibility in how we service clients, meeting them where they are, adapting to their operating model, and helping them build the right mix of technology, process, and support to scale with confidence.
[06:51] Matt Saxon: Something SitusAMC does so well. So, definitely reach out to them if you’re looking to take that next step as a company.
[06:58] That’s going to wrap things up for this edition of MPA TV. I want to thank Tenielle Hammett from SitusAMC once again for joining us, and thank you for watching. I’m Matt Saxon saying so long, and we’ll see you next time.
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