words Al Woods
A hot housing market, labor shortages, supply crunches, and economic uncertainty. What could go wrong? Here is how Mr. Cooper has remained committed to delivering results for customers by pursuing a forward-looking growth strategy and having the teams and infrastructure in place to manage uncertainty in 2021 and beyond.
Toward the end of 2019, based on cyclical global markets, many economists debated the possibility of a recession in 2020. Some believed a recession would hit by 2020, with others believing that the markets would be fine until at least 2022.
That’s when COVID-19 hit, grinding the world to a halt. Job losses affected millions around the world and industries as disparate as education, transportation, manufacturing, and entertainment were all hit hard by the pandemic.
To spur economic activity, interest rates were lowered, leading to record-high home sales and purchases as well as mortgage refinances.
To keep up with the demand – and to safeguard the interests of the company’s customers – Mr. Cooper, one of the largest mortgage companies in the country, hired over 3,000 people in 2020. Mr. Cooper reported a record-breaking Q2 2020 with loan originations generating pretax income of over $430 million. In 2019, revenue was over $2.5 billion, and the company serviced almost four million customers and handled loans worth almost $650 billion, of which about $40 billion were new loans.
Mr. Cooper attributes these robust results to the efforts of the company’s many teams. The company is as committed as ever to facilitating employee success by providing everyone with the resources they need to create value for customers.
Many of the new jobs Mr. Cooper has filled were for loan officers, mortgage underwriters, customer service representatives, and home advisers. However, team expansions are only part of the solution. Since March 2020, over 95 percent of Mr. Cooper’s employees have worked remotely, and technology, collaboration, and facilitating work-from-home are just as important as hiring the right people for the right roles.
Here are examples of how Mr. Cooper navigated the pandemic job market to support expansion and continue to service customers with value-added services and benefits.
Technology and Work-from-Home
The monumental shift from office work to work-from-home was not without its challenges. While worker commute times essentially fell to zero, there were many issues for companies across the globe regarding equipment availability, connectivity, and scheduling. By working closely with partners and vendors, Mr. Cooper was able to quickly and effectively onboard all workers – old and new alike – to the team’s scheduling, collaboration, and online work systems so that everyone could continue their work with minimal interruptions and downtime.
These changes were made quickly, but they were months in the making. When executives at Mr. Cooper first saw reports of the emerging pandemic, they quickly adjusted work strategies and moved from having 10 percent of the workforce remote to having about 97 percent remote by last spring. Since then, the company has rallied, and everyone has done a wonderful job of working within a new normal – delivering value, processing applications, and helping customers despite the obvious obstacles posed by the pandemic.
Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion
Mr. Cooper is a leading voice in fair, accessible, and transparent work opportunities for all. Not only does Mr. Cooper provide specialized training and licensing programs for new hires entering the mortgage industry, but it also has what can be best described as a meticulously designed diversity and inclusion program. This program helps the company attract new talent from all across the country. Collectively, the breadth and depth of experiences, skills, and training of the company’s teams are what help Mr. Cooper deliver value-added results to its customers.
AI-Powered Application Processing
Mr. Cooper has made substantial investments in its IT infrastructure over the last 10 years. In April 2021, Mr. Cooper partnered with the Google Cloud AI platform to release over 300 proprietary mortgage-specific AI models that can change the industry for the better. These models can process thousands of pages per minute with exceptionally high accuracy. This can lower processing times and costs and helps Mr. Cooper onboard new portfolios and respond more quickly to customer needs.
Looking Forward to 2021 and Beyond
While challenges persist, opportunities also abound. With a forward-thinking, growth-focused strategy and the teams and infrastructure needed to deliver results over the months and years to come, Mr. Cooper is perfectly positioned to continue servicing customers and helping the mortgage space move forward. Learn more about the company and its commitment to its teams by visiting https://careers.mrcooper.com/.
