HML. Homeloan Management Ltd

The illusionist Derren Brown claimed to use the ‘wisdom of crowds’ or collective intelligence to correctly predict the National Lottery results in 2009 – and although HML’s Business Intelligence team use the same principles in our work, the fact that I’m penning this blog tells you that we haven’t won the jackpot just yet.

 

Those of you familiar with the old Mortgage Investor Report (MIR) will know that it utilises the largest commercially available pool of mortgage data to analyse trends in arrears and repossessions and deliver a monthly report.

 

The sheer volume of our data means that we have a credible, representative market share and average performance levels are likely to give an accurate view of the wider market performance  –an example of collective intelligence because the insight that can be drawn from the pool is far greater than through individual portfolios.

 

With any good product though, improving it is vital to retain its appeal. We’ve received and acted on feedback from clients like: ‘the past is interesting, but what about the future?’ and ‘I would love to digest all this information, but I just don’t have the time.’

 

We’ve developed an intuitive user-friendly MIR that anyone can use to cut right to the chase. For example, if you just want to know the percentage of prime buy-to-let accounts that are 6+ months in arrears, it only requires a couple of clicks on an Excel spreadsheet. What’s more, another couple of clicks away is our prediction for the future arrears levels of these accounts based on a series of economic factors and borrower behaviour patterns.

 

And this is where our clients can drive real value.

 

Applying these forecasts to a future business strategy could identify the volume of staff required for servicing and collections activity, dictate the terms of a third-party supplier contract or forecast funding levels - potentially freeing up the equivalent of a handsome lottery win.