The human touch continues to be a driver of mortgage borrower satisfaction, according to PwC’s home lending experience study released today. Nearly three-fifths of home buyers seek advice from lenders, PwC found in its interviews with 1,500 recent and prospective buyers. “The lender that prepares for and welcomes this early conversation is the lender that is most likely to position itself as the trusted adviser for the end-to-end home buying process.” Such advice can include saving for a down payment or setting a purchase budget.
About half of the survey respondents received check-in or follow-up calls from their lenders. Of those who did get a call, 52% said they would be “very likely to use the same lender again for their next loan,” PwC found. The same was true for just 23% of borrowers who had not received a follow-up call. Closings continued to be dominated by an in-person experience, with a majority of buyers signing closing documents and paying costs in-person.
The report also included data about the number of mortgage shoppers (42%) open to seeing large technology firms enter the real estate lending business and the growing number of borrowers who would use a voice assistant like Amazon’s Alexa as part of the home buying process.
