Written by:  Nathan Thomas

a la mode announces HomeBeacon, harnesses new BLE wireless communication for location-aware tours

Written by Nathan Thomas on November 8, 2013

Naples, Florida - a la mode, one of the dominant players in the real estate industry's technology sector, is announcing the launch of HomeBeacon, a groundbreaking new mobile app targeted at enhancing the consumer experience when looking for homes. HomeBeacon uses Bluetooth Low Energy "iBeacon" technology to allow listing agents to create interactive location-aware property presentations which pop up automatically on consumer mobile devices simply by being near a listed property.   Read more...

“Appraisal Quality Control” white paper released from collaborative industry effort

Written by Nathan Thomas on August 20, 2013

Naples, FL - In preparation for the January 14th, 2014 CFPB effective date, a la mode announced today the release of a multidisciplinary white paper entitled "Appraisal Quality Control: Best Practices for accuracy, efficiency, and compliance." The recommendations and checklists are a collaborative result from three companies with direct experience in the processing of high volumes of appraisal transactions. a la mode's Mercury Network team provided insight from experience as the software providers for over 500 of the nation's lenders and AMCs and the technology backbone behind over 30,000 appraisal deliveries a day. AXIS Appraisal Management Solutions, a leading national AMC with a reputation for excellent quality and vendor relations, and MasterServ Financial, a leading solutions provider for loan portfolio management in the public and private sector, both contributed insight from the mass-volume efficiency and quality perspectives. "Effective appraisal quality control is high on everyone's priority list as the industry balances appraisal quality, operations efficiency, and increasing compliance concerns," stated Jennifer Miller, president of a la mode's Mortgage Solutions Division. "The industry is working hard to comply all of these new appraisal regulations and frankly, no one has time to start from scratch and hope to build a compliant and effective QC process all by themselves. Sharing knowledge is a win-win for everyone." The white paper can be downloaded at www.MercuryVMP.com/QC.   Read more...

a la mode adds RentRange to the TOTAL Store

Written by Nathan Thomas on July 8, 2013

Naples, FL - a la mode, the creator of the market-leading TOTAL family of real estate appraisal products, announced today that the RentRange® Advanced Report is available in their TOTAL Store and fully integrated with the TOTAL family of appraisal software. The Store allows any appraiser to securely select from a growing list of third-party and a la mode products designed to extend the feature set of the core TOTAL appraisal programs. The TOTAL family of software products is the dominant appraisal report platform in the industry, used by more than half of all appraisers nationwide. RentRange is the premier national provider of residential rental data, analytics, and valuation solutions to appraisers, institutional investors, mortgage lenders, and financial institutions. The Advanced Report helps appraisers determine an estimate of how much a particular property can be rented for in the open market. It also provides a visual of the segmented low, median, and high rental values by radius and zip code, and includes other key factors such as localized vacancy rates, saturation percentages, and market strength indicators. Appraisers can now include a PDF copy of this comprehensive report in their final appraisal. Because of RentRange's streamlined integration with TOTAL 2013 through TOTAL Store's Application Programming Interface, these reports are produced without retyping location data or opening a web browser. Eric Taylor, President of RentRange LLC, is confident that the Advanced Report will create new revenue producing opportunities for the valuation community. "As with any automated solution, there is growing demand for feet-on-the-street validation of condition and location based factors that influence overall value and marketability. The entry level incorporation of our report as a value-added supplement and the more complex integration of our underlying data to develop an assisted ‘Rental Price Opinion' have each proven to be viable industry innovations in this investor focused marketplace." John Farley, President of a la mode's Appraisal Division, welcomes RentRange to the long list of TOTAL Store Merchants. "We're excited to include RentRange in the TOTAL Store. The amount of specialized data they compile, even on a localized level, is substantial. We think appraisers will really benefit from using the report tool, especially for investment properties," Farley said. The TOTAL Store, and the associated integration APIs, allow third-party vendors to seamlessly integrate into the underlying TOTAL product architecture for a superior customer experience, all while avoiding the delays of traditional integration deal negotiations. TOTAL products are used by more of the nation's real estate appraisers than all other competing software applications combined, so inclusion in the TOTAL Store is essential to reaching the vast majority of real estate appraisers. For more information, visit www.alamode.com/TOTALStore.   Read more...