The Power of Human-First: A 2021 Year in Review and 2022 Forecast

*This article was originally posted on HousingWire.com*

Artificial intelligence is rapidly moving beyond experimentation and into real business impact across the mortgage industry. In this executive conversation, Total Expert CEO and Founder Joe Welu sat down with Allison LaForgia to explore how lenders can turn AI from a buzzword into a competitive advantage.

Welu explains why understanding borrower intent is becoming one of the most powerful competitive advantages in lending. From millions of AI-powered conversations to the growing importance of trust and compliance, the discussion explores how lenders can use AI to create smarter, more personalized customer journeys.

“There’s really two types of companies,” Welu said. Some are “moving from experimentation and pilots into full scale. Let’s transform the business. Let’s build the future.”

Others, he said, are still “treading lightly and cautiously” as they try to determine “what’s the right formula for their organization to really adopt it.”

What is clear to Welu is that the stakes are rising fast. “There’s an extreme bifurcation happening in really every business right now,” he said. “There’s not going to be this middle anymore. There’s going to be very clear winners, the people that are getting ahead of it.”

In his view, lenders that make AI a strategic priority are already “getting a lot of ROI and impact,” while others are “certainly falling behind.”

Welu said Total Expert’s approach is different because it starts with intelligence and context, not just automation. “AI agents are very, very powerful,” he said, because “it actually can do the task, it can call the customer, it can send the note, complete something that a human would have had to complete.”

But that power only works if the underlying context is right. “You’re only going to get the outcomes that you want if you have the right insight, intelligence and, more importantly, context that is feeding those AI agents,” he said. “Combining these systems of intelligence directly with a system of action is really how you transform the outcomes you want in your business.”

That is where Customer IQ comes in. Welu described it as “this intelligence layer that has all this context,” helping lenders understand “what’s important now” for each borrower.

Intent, he said, is rarely one signal alone. Rather, it is “a series of things that are put together” like equity, demographics and life events like getting married, having children, or downsizing.

The goal is to understand “what is this customer really caring about at this moment” and then meet them there “with the voice, the empathy, the education.”

On the engagement side, Welu said Total Expert’s AI Sales Assistant is already providing scale and insight into how borrowers want to interact. “We’re on pace this year to do over 130 million voice AI agents,” he said.

Those conversations, he added, show that AI can often improve the front end of the experience. “They actually, as it turns out, maybe not shocking, listen better than our average sales people,” he said. “They have perfect memory, so they always remember the last conversation.”

When rate opportunities open, it creates “infinite ability” to reach borrowers quickly, while still handing off qualified consumers to human advisors at the right time.

For Welu, the future is not AI replacing people, but AI and humans working together throughout the borrower lifecycle. “The consumers really have just overwhelmingly voiced positive” feedback, he said, while loan officers gain more time to focus on advice instead of repetitive outreach. “

AI plus humans are going to really redefine what a perfect customer journey is,” Welu said. “I think it’s just going to raise the bar.”

We sat down with Ross Diedrich, CEO of Covered, to explore a growing challenge and opportunity facing mortgage lenders today: homeowners’ insurance. As insurance volatility, climate risk, and rising premiums increasingly impact loan timelines and borrower affordability, lenders can no longer treat insurance as a back-office compliance task. In our conversation, Ross shared how embedded insurance experiences can transform a historically fragmented process into a strategic advantage for lenders improving borrower experience while unlocking new revenue and retention opportunities.

For most borrowers, getting a homeowners’ insurance policy has been treated as the final step in the mortgage process. A necessary requirement to confirm before closing rather than a critical component that’s integrated into the broader borrower experience. But that approach is becoming increasingly outdated.

Rising premiums, climate-related risks, and shifting carrier appetites are making insurance a much more complex part of the homebuying journey. In some markets, borrowers are facing fewer coverage options and significantly higher costs, which can disrupt closing timelines or affect loan affordability. What was once a simple compliance task is now a critical factor in the lending process.

As a result, lenders are beginning to rethink how insurance fits into each borrower's journey toward homeownership. By embedding insurance earlier in the process, lenders can reduce friction, improve borrower experiences, and unlock new opportunities for long-term engagement.

Total Expert customers can now integrate insurance solutions from Covered directly into their borrower journeys to transform a historically fragmented process into a seamless, digital experience.

Bringing insurance into the borrower journey

Traditionally, borrowers begin shopping for homeowners’ insurance late in the mortgage process, often while juggling multiple closing requirements. This timing can lead to delays, document chases, and added stress for both borrowers and loan teams.

Planning and accounting for insurance needs from the outset changes that dynamic.

With Total Expert, originators can use key borrower milestones such as loan purpose, property type, or stage in the application process to create personalized communications that include a simple “click-to-quote” experience, allowing the borrower to compare policy options from dozens of carriers in seconds.

Because the experience is integrated into the lender’s existing workflows, originators remain central to the relationship while borrowers gain a faster, easier way to secure coverage.

Once a borrower selects a policy, their contact record in Total Expert is automatically updated with key details like the carrier name, premium, and policy effective date. This eliminates manual follow-up and ensures lenders have clear visibility into the status of a critical closing requirement.  

The result is a smoother experience for borrowers and fewer administrative headaches for lenders.

Expanding coverage options in a changing market

Insurance availability is an increasing concern in many parts of the country. Some lenders have responded by building captive insurance agencies or internal brokerage capabilities to capture more of the opportunity.

While those strategies can be effective, they can also face limitations when borrowers encounter complex risk scenarios or when carrier availability varies by region. Covered helps address those gaps by providing lenders and borrowers with access to a broader insurance marketplace.

As a licensed digital insurance agency operating in all 50 states, Covered connects borrowers to more than 65 national and regional carriers. This expanded network improves the likelihood that borrowers can find bindable coverage, even in challenging or high-risk markets.

For lenders, this additional access helps reduce the risk of last-minute surprises that could jeopardize closing timelines.

Moving beyond referral links

Some lenders attempt to address insurance needs through basic referral links. While these links provide borrowers with a place to start, they often introduce new challenges.

A referral link typically sends borrowers outside the lender’s ecosystem, leaving originator teams with little visibility into the process. Documentation must still be collected and recorded manually, and lenders remain responsible for ensuring policies meet closing requirements.

A licensed, integrated insurance partner offers a much more seamless approach.

Covered manages the documentation-heavy aspects of the process, delivering evidence of insurance, declaration pages, and invoices directly back to the lender. Licensed U.S.-based agents also provide expert support to help borrowers navigate complex underwriting conditions and ensure policies are successfully bound before closing.

This combination of technology and specialized expertise helps lenders maintain visibility while simplifying the borrower experience.

A long-term opportunity beyond closing

Perhaps the biggest opportunity lies beyond the initial mortgage transaction.

Unlike many financial products, homeowners’ insurance renews annually. That renewal cycle creates an ongoing opportunity for lenders to stay connected with borrowers and provide meaningful value over time.

By monitoring renewal activity, lenders can proactively identify borrowers experiencing premium spikes and help them shop for better coverage options before costs escalate. This can help prevent “escrow shock,” reduce the likelihood of lender-placed insurance events, and strengthen borrower trust.

Insurance insights can also support refinance recapture strategies. Rising premiums increase borrowers’ monthly payments and can push debt-to-income ratios higher. Helping borrowers find insurance savings may restore refinance eligibility and preserve opportunities that might otherwise be lost.

Even simple campaigns such as automated loan anniversary reminders to review insurance policies can help lenders remain relevant long after closing.

Turning insurance into a strategic advantage

Borrowers who shop through Covered often uncover meaningful savings opportunities— averaging roughly $1,240 annually—by comparing policies across multiple carriers.

But the true value lies in the experience lenders can deliver.

By embedding insurance directly into the borrower journey through Total Expert, lenders can streamline closing workflows, reduce operational friction, and create new opportunities to engage borrowers throughout the life of the loan.

What was once treated as a routine closing requirement is quickly becoming a strategic advantage for lenders focused on delivering modern, customer-first homeownership experiences.

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Total Expert Chief Lending Officer Dan Catinella joined the Lykken on Lending podcast to discuss what’s next for Total Expert, and more importantly, what’s next for lenders who are serious about growing their business in 2026 and beyond. At the core of this next evolution is a powerful shift in mindset: if you still think of your CRM as a static database, you’re already behind. Dan outlined how Total Expert has evolved into a true Customer Operating System that continuously enriches and refreshes contact data to give originators real-time context around credit position, tappable equity, rate opportunities, and life events.

From there, the conversation moved into the practical impact of that intelligence. With Customer IQ embedded across the platform, lenders can identify who to contact, when to engage, and what opportunity to present with personalized messaging. Total Expert's marketing automation and agentic AI will work seamlessly behind the scenes to help lenders engage faster, more effectively, and at scale. Dan also shared how our AI Sales Assistant extends the capacity of every originator, conducting human-like outreach, qualifying opportunities, and even scheduling meetings directly on a loan officer’s calendar. It’s not about replacing the originator, it’s about empowering them to focus on advice, relationships, and conversion while technology handles the prospecting and follow-up that too often falls through the cracks.

If you’re thinking about borrower retention, refinance waves, or how to compete in a market where speed and personalization matter more than ever, this is a conversation you won’t want to miss. Dan and David explored how data intelligence, automation, and AI are converging to create a new growth engine for lenders that's built not on isolated transactions, but on the consistent engagement that deepens relationships and earns customers for life.

Catch the conversation