BrokerEngine was developed in conjunction with a real mortgage brokerage, not in a software lab. It began when an Australian mortgage broker wanted to write more business and provide clients with a seamless experience, without sacrificing his quality of life to gruelling work weeks and high stress levels…
Hi, my name’s Craig Vaughan, and I’m a mortgage broker by trade, and the co-founder of BrokerEngine.
I run multiple mortgage broking brands and was nominated in the 2014 Broker of the Year Awards (Top 5) and in 2015 (Top 10). In 2016, I was fortunate enough to receive two nominations – one for Broker of the Year, and one for Broker Group of the Year. All while working 20-25 hours per week and enjoying 2-3 months’ holiday a year.
But it wasn’t always this way…
By about 2010 I was settling a reasonable $20-$25 million a year, but I was also putting in far too many hours, and following no system.
In fact, my first 3 years in mortgage broking were almost a complete waste, because I didn’t have any method of keeping in touch with clients.
By the time I developed a system, it was too late. Those initial clients were cold, and I had to keep running hard on the treadmill to find new clients and maintain my volumes.
My stress levels were constantly red-lining. I was always fearful that something had been missed on a deal, or that it would go south at the last moment. And I hardly took any extended holidays, because I was afraid the wheels would fall off.
With no method to keep in touch with clients both before and after settlement, I knew I was missing out on a tonne of repeat and referral business.
Like many brokers, I was building my practice based on sheer hard work, not getting smart automation to do the heavy lifting for me.
So, what was my solution?
Essentially, it was insane levels of work.
I threw more and more hours at my practice, and invested heavily in digital marketing and online lead generation. I also took a bunch of training to refine my sales process and improve my conversion rates.
And the good news is… all of this worked!
I now had a consistent influx of leads, and my sales process became very effective indeed. (All based around specific scripting and structuring of the process, mind you. I’ve never considered myself a “natural salesman” and still don’t to this day).
But the bad news was that I was now seriously run off my feet with grueling work hours, high stress levels and almost no ability to “switch off” from the business.
I was writing about $50M to $60M a year, which was a big improvement from where I had started – but I no longer had a life.
The answer was smart automation that linked in every part of the loan lodgement and approval process.
I needed to do something, so I tried a number of existing CRM applications and aggregator software. But none of them did everything I needed.
For example, I tried relying on my aggregator software. Yes, there were basic task reminders, but not nearly customisable enough to cover all the potential “gaps”.
So then I tried ACT! By Sage, which wasn’t too bad, actually. It could automate some of the things I wanted, and was quite customisable.
But after a year of building the system within ACT! I was fed up with it. Ultimately, it was just another generic CRM system that was never designed for mortgage broking and would never quite get there.
After testing several other products, again and again I came up against the same problem of limited functionality and non-industry specific focus.
Initially, the intention was just to build a system for myself so I could make my own business more profitable and also grow my team.Then, as the software began to take shape, I started to see the potential to take it to market as a software application “by a broker, for brokers”.
The dream was to build the world’s first Broker Operating System (BrokerOS™️) – a system that solves the shortcomings of other software and gives brokers an edge in this age of digital disruption.
And so, BrokerEngine was born.
And one of the core philosophies of the system is to “Automate the automatable, so you can free up the broker and team for higher-value activity”…
For example, it’s one thing to be reminded to perform a certain task, such as emailing or texting a client to ask them for a list of documents, or to update them on the status of their approval.
But it’s another thing to have the software auto-generate the exact deal-specific email and pop it in your queue, ready to review and click “SEND”.
(It’s automation like that which can cut literally hours of drudgery out of your day as a broker.)
And it’s automation like this that makes each broker more dollar-productive.
But eventually, as my firm continued to grow, I needed to bring on more team members
to support me as a broker, and also more brokers under my three brands.
And that’s where I hit another big roadblock: how to efficiently scale my team.
When you’re writing, say, $25M p.a., there is time in the day to manage loan processing from end to end. But if you want to scale your volume, as I did, then you need to be supported by one or more loan processors.
But the challenge is this:
Because loan applications can be so fiddly and so varied, it is very hard to find, train and retain excellent support staff.
Plus, even the best people who aren’t supported by good systems can make mistakes. (And clients don’t care who made the mistake… they just remember the poor experience they got, and will never come back or refer as a result).
So, how do most brokers deal with this (me included)?
They usually end up “hovering” over every deal, micromanaging the process to ensure that mistakes don’t occur – ultimately destroying the freedom they were trying to create by hiring a supporting team in the first place!
I hit every roadblock you can think of when it came to hiring team members…
Firstly, it was hard to find people with the work ethic and eye for detail that I needed, especially because I live in a regional area, away from the big employment centres.
I interviewed dozens of candidates. And once a successful candidate started, I then had to train them up.
It turned out that some didn’t have the “skills to pay the bills”, and I had to let them go.
Others were great, but they ended up leaving after a couple of years – one to move interstate and the other to go on maternity leave.
So then I had wasted all that training time, and was back to square one: processing my own loans and not sitting in front of clients!
This was a critical problem that I had to solve if I was ever going to realise my goal of settling great numbers without working long hours.
Again, I found that existing software systems had no clear way of:
So, over time, my team and I developed a system that:
And the best part: because of the level of standardisation this achieves, it is now MUCH easier to find and train staff!
Plus, because they pick up the process quickly, it’s easier to retain them as well.
At the time of writing, my support team members are based in Manila, surrounded by a team of other loan processors who support other BrokerEngine users (and if you decide to give BrokerEngine a try, we can give you an introduction to our recommended support, who are already familiar with the software).
That’s just the support team side of the equation. I’ve also brought on 4 more brokers into my broker group – and tight systems have been the key to making them happy and productive.
They get to focus on writing more business, and I get an easy way to keep track of how they’re doing and how to help them improve.
Now, they wonder what they ever did without BrokerEngine.
Over the last several years, the software has been consistently improved and refined, with all my deals and those of my brokers running through it. Starting in 2016, more brokers started joining us, including multiple MPA Top 100 Brokers, Young Guns, State Finalists and growing independent brokers and firms.
User feedback has been invaluable for refining the system and ensuring it works well with a variety of different processes that brokers may be using internally.
I’d like to think that most if not all of the glitches have been ironed out; each new problem we faced as brokers has been met with a solution in the software.
In my own business, the software has been so successful that I’m now completely self-sufficient, relying only on existing clients for repeat and referral business.
This is mainly because the automated Loan Review module of BrokerEngine keeps me topped up with more deals and referral clients as I can handle.
The user can indicate for each deal how often they’d like the loan to be reviewed. For example, every 6 to 12 months… еor 3 months prior to a fixed rate expiry or IO expiry.
When the trigger is hit, the system automatically prompts the team to:
Once that’s done, the system then provides the broker with all the information they need to make a decision on whether to recommend:
Then, based on whichever option the broker chooses, the system spins up an automated Loan Review Report based around smart, conversion-optimised templates.
Here’s a snapshot of how this looks over a typical 6 month period:
(My client base has a lot of loans with LVRs over 80%, which somewhat limits the potential for refinances. Other brokers can probably do better than this).
This system works so well for at least 3 reasons:
And of course, this process is excellent for maintaining trail, which withers away over time unless it is nurtured.
(Some brokers think they’re maintaining their trail simply by sending out a regular email newsletter. I’ve done that too, and the problem is that it’s not very meaningful or personalised. Making it personalised makes all the difference, in my experience).
In my early days of being a mortgage broker, I was all about the numbers. I wanted to increase my volume and I didn’t care how hard I had to work to do it.
At just $50 to $60M a year, I quickly saw what that did to my quality of life – and I had to do something to fix the situation.
Now, my priorities have shifted even more in the direction of work-life balance.
As a result, I’ve been able to settle $100M+ while also working very moderate hours as a broker (with most of my time now focused on improving BrokerEngine.)
In fact, in the year I did my biggest settlement numbers, I took 3 trips:
a motorbike trip to the Top End of Australia; a cycling trip from Auckland to Wellington, NZ;
and an 8-week campervan trip from Halifax, Canada to Seattle, USA.
The increase in income is nice, but for me, the biggest positive impact has been getting my life back.
I only work 9am to 5pm – not full days. I usually take a break in the middle of the day to go for a cycle or to the gym. I’m home every evening to be with my wife and young family. I don’t work weekends. I finish up at 1pm on Fridays. And I’m able to go to conferences or PD days without having to stress about whether my clients are being looked after.
Now, even more than building my own brokerage, my absolute mission in life is to bring these benefits to others in the mortgage broking community.
So that’s my story as a broker to date. I don’t claim to have all the answers – far from it. In fact, I’ve probably made more mistakes than the average broker along the way.
But what I have done, is work out a way to write big volumes, while building a happy team and enjoying plenty of time off.
If you’d like to learn how you can join me on this journey,
contact us for a free Personal Demo of BrokerEngine.
You’ll be glad you did!
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