HomeSide Seeks Internet Customers With New ByOwner.com Relationship.(Brief Article)

HomeSide Lending Inc., in an effort to increase the number of loans it receives via the Internet, has signed an agreement to be the exclusive mortgage provider for Long Island, N.Y.-based ByOwner.com.

ByOwner.com, on a private-label basis, will use HomeSide's online, rules-based platform and customer call center to handle back-office processing and offer loans to site visitors. HomeSide will pay a monthly fee for the marketing made possible through the partnership.

HomeSide, which has spent the last year and a half developing the platform by conducting consumer focus groups and working with Fannie Mae, claims it can reduce loan application information by more than 50% and give approvals in as little as 10 minutes.

D. Robert Davis, senior vice president of global e-business development of HomeSide, said the company achieves profitability in online production by utilizing other brand names instead of trying to build their own.

Mr. Davis attributed the plight of many online lenders that have either gone out of business or failed to achieve profitability to spending large sums of money to build a brand name without actually changing the loan process.

"They were working a lot of leads, but not closing a lot of business," he said, citing increased capture and conversion rates for HomeSide in the ...