It’s Time: Why I Started Livegage
After spending 25 years in mortgages and over a decade as an enterprise-wide CIO for a mortgage company involved in mortgage investment, asset management, mortgage servicing, and origination, I had developed enough passion and frustration with the industry that I realized it was time for someone to do something about the challenges faced by the industry. My frustration led me to quit my job, and my expertise, combined with my passion for the industry, led to the founding of Livegage.
As I worked through the entire gamut of the mortgage ecosystem, it was apparent to me that the foundation of it all, mortgage servicing, was the most ignored aspect. A customer’s and, to some extent, a mortgage buyer’s relationship with the originator lasts 2-6 months, whereas the relationship with the mortgage servicer lasts through the life of the mortgage (including servicing transfers). Yet, mortgage servicing runs on outdated technology that doesn’t lend itself well to automation, resulting in manual processes. Manual processes cause data and document discrepancies, resulting in errors, and a higher cost of servicing, which eventually affects the secondary market due to the yield leakage contributed by the cost of due diligence, cash and advance reconciliation, and missed or incorrect servicing milestones.
There was clearly a need for a new thought process and a suite of wraparound products that would work on top of any legacy system of record and deliver automation and efficiencies despite antiquated core systems. It was important that this product suite paid for itself by significantly reducing the cost of servicing, as servicers already pay a hefty fee for core legacy systems.
And so back in 2021, it became very clear to me that I couldn’t keep ignoring the idea I’d been thinking about for a while: if I wanted to completely reinvent mortgage servicing, I couldn’t do it inside a mortgage company. It had to be a Fintech focused on residential mortgages.
A Fintech capable of imagining possibilities, inventing new technologies, and innovating residential mortgage servicing.
Fast forward four years, and we have imagined, invented (filed five patents), and are innovating with the launch of a product suite powered by our patent-pending revolutionary AI engine, VAIDA™
Technology has evolved. So Have We.
Timing matters. AI has matured enough to handle the scale and complexity of mortgage servicing. At Livegage, we have the right model, built by the right team, and we’re confident we can transition the industry from manual processes to intelligent automation across multiple areas, reducing costs and boosting operational efficiency throughout the life of the loan.
We have assembled a team of Mortgage Servicing Experts and Technology Experts. This team was born inside mortgage servicing, and it’s not a group of techies trying to learn mortgages from their clients. We live and breathe mortgage servicing and also happen to be technology experts.
We’re not thinking incremental – we’re thinking transformational.
What Comes Next
In this blog series, I’ll share more about the vision behind Livegage and explore how evolving technologies, including but not limited to AI and Blockchain, can finally solve the problems that servicing and the broader mortgage ecosystem have carried for too long. From compliance risk to investor accounting, to loan administration, and mid-month securitization, I’ll explain why now is the moment for servicing to embrace real, fundamental change and how we’re making it happen.
Because after all my years in this industry, one thing is clear to me: it’s time.
About This Series
“It’s Time” is a series from Livegage’s CEO and founder, Anupam Sarwaikar, that shares insights on why the company was started, the vision guiding it, and how AI-driven solutions can fundamentally transform mortgage servicing.
