Steve D Valentine discusses why automation in real estate lending can't replace strategic thinking. Technology handles repetitive tasks, but successful lending still requires understanding your market, building relationships, and making decisions that fit your specific situation.
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I think technology is a good thing, but I think technology also is a bad thing. And from that regard, you know, from a lending standpoint, everything is so automated now, so it kind of takes out that need or that element to really think. So for my team, I mean, maybe because I'm old school, maybe because I've been doing this a million years, I don't know, this is how I grew up in the business. It's always with strategy and thought. So if it doesn't work, why doesn't it work? Work? What's the guideline saying, Kim? Is there a way that we can move through that? Is there a different approach or strategy? Understanding and being able to dive into guidelines and then navigate the ands and the ors, that's just part of it. But with technology, every day it feels like it's changing more to just the automation of yes or no. Well, as you and I both know, I like to say a scenario, a buyer's scenario, is like a fingerprint. There are no two fingerprints alike.
There's so many variables to everybody, which is the same reason that one loan doesn't fit the consumer. And just like one way we sell a house doesn't fit the consumer on mine side, right? Because there's too many variables. You got family members, you got all kinds of different things that are moving parts. And we have to, you know, I know that you do a lot of what I do, which is we have to ask a lot of questions to get to what the real crux and the root of the person is, to figure out how to truly help them. And sometimes it's interesting how hard we have to try to break down the wall to help somebody.
