Every conference that I’ve been to in the past year has had at least two talks on the topic.

These talks are often optimistic: “It’ll write emails for you,” “Find efficiencies in your process,” “Have hyper-contextualized client interactions.”

But after the talk, this optimism is accompanied by worried whispers in the hall saying, “Will AI take my job?”, “How does AI amplify fraud?”

As a broker, what should you believe? And maybe more importantly, what should you be doing RIGHT NOW to be fully prepared?

Let’s level set: Where are we now with AI?

Every day, new AI tools are coming to market. From simple tasks like writing an email, or summarizing a set of notes—to “flashier” tools that will write a song or create a flowchart.

These tools (especially the flashy ones) are often met with a lot of excitement. And perhaps this is the correct response. It’s impressive technology.

But where the rubber hits the road is when you’re forced to answer the question, “How does this technology make my mortgage business more efficient?”

I’ve worked with hundreds of top mortgage professionals in Canada on their technology, and the best answer I’ve seen to this question? Using Fathom to summarize a Zoom call. Definitely cool, but not changing the mortgage game.

So, what’s really going on?

So, if AI is not (currently) a game-changer, why is it being talked about endlessly at all mortgage conferences?

The analogy that I like to use is this: picture yourself as a surfer waiting for a wave. In the distance, you see dark, ominous clouds—guaranteed to bring once-in-a-lifetime waves. But for now, the water is pretty calm.

Right now, AI is that storm in the distance. Everyone can see it, and they’re calling it out, but the translation to real results has not really happened yet.

The more cynical answer to “why people are talking about it” is that opportunistic salesmen are using the incoming storm to sell you something you don’t really need.

Don’t get on the wrong wave

To continue the surfer analogy, you don’t want to take a smaller wave to shore, and then have to spend A LOT of effort to get back out to ride the monster waves.

I’ve heard stories of people (outside the mortgage industry) spending six months and $100K+ on a custom AI solution. Then ChatGPT releases a new model (i.e., version), which makes this solution completely obsolete.

We also don’t know what we don’t know. Right now, we’re looking for a “wave,” but something else might offer a better ride.

A good analogy is the mobile phone revolution. At first, everyone thought, “Cool, I can load a website on my phone!” Then the App Store came out and completely changed the game for the mobile experience.

New technologies enable new modalities that can have a far greater impact. Right now, we’re forcing AI into the Software-as-a-Service “box,” and I don’t think that’s correct, not long term.

So, what to do?

The storm is coming, but you don’t want to ride an early wave…what should you do?

To start, you should NOT turn your back to the storm. Don’t ignore AI. Stay curious and continuously educate yourself on the new solutions available.

You should also be conducting low-effort, low-cost tests of these new AI solutions. Especially as a broker, you can try a tool same-day, whereas a bigger financial institution needs months just to get “approval.”

Finally, leverage your network. You’ll never be able to ride every wave, but you can ask others about their experience.

The rapid accumulation (through tests) and sharing (through your network) of information will be a HUGE advantage, especially as technological innovation accelerates.

C3PO is not taking your job

Hopefully, this framework has put your mind at ease on where we’re at today with AI, and how to best prepare for what’s coming.

But for those of you who are still worried about AI, the parallel I like to draw is the pre-Internet/email era.

I’m sure brokers were worried about the value they could provide, with clients being able to directly send docs to the lender—even without a fax machine! But what happened?

The broker channel has grown significantly since then. Because top brokers differentiated on being a trusted advisor, not a paper-pusher. And ultimately, that’s all clients care about. Everything else is just noise.

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Last modified: November 28, 2024