8.28.26 Originators and Technology; Figure’s Alysse Guitar on Marketing; Jackson Hole Symposium

Robbie Chrisman Welcome to the Chrisman Commentary, Daily Mortgage News Podcast. I'm your host, Robbie Chrisman. Topics on today's episode include an origination perspective on technology, rates, affordability, and policy, and my interview with Figure's Alysse Guitar on marketing lending products in a digital environment where both trust and attention spans are waning. Here, take a listen to a little preview. Robbie Chrisman In this age of technology, where we can get a hundred different scripts for the same type of message, we can specifically say we want to send this out at this time point versus this versus this. Here's our drip campaign. Can you talk about the human creativity that still needs to exist in marketing? Because at some point things can get so good technology-wise that the formulaic can seem human, but I would venture to say that we're always going to need that human element, especially in something like marketing, where the whole point of marketing is moving someone, making somebody feel a certain type of way to act in a certain way. Alysse Guitar Absolutely. I think that AI can increase your leverage, it can help you do more things, but it cannot be creative. Literally, the way that these models work is they look at what has been done before, and then they predict what is going to happen based on that. So there's no disrupting the pattern. So I think human creativity is going to be more and more important and going to stand out more and more as AI has forced so many things to like coalesce and look the same. If you're able to stand out, if you're able to think and innovate and be creative, it's just going to shoot you to the top. Robbie Chrisman Can we dive into that slightly? Just thoughts on creativity that you've seen work really well. I love some examples, and not to put you on the spot too much, but but things where you're like, yes, like a machine could have never figured that out. Alysse Guitar I mean, I'm not going to be able to come up with something off the top of my head, but I will say, like, I see a lot of marketing and I see a lot of decks and I see a lot of like what people put together. It's become so obvious when somebody does something themselves versus a machine does it in a good way and a bad way. Like I've seen things that I'm like, oh, you could have spent five seconds and put this through AI and it could have gotten better. And then there's anything that kind of disrupts the pattern, it just stands out more now. Like the patterns have become so overwhelming that if you can just kind of stand out and be human, be an individual, I think it's even more valuable. Sponsor Thanks to Experian for sponsoring this week's podcasts. From lenders and landlords to employers and consumers, Experian helps connect the lending ecosystem with data and insights needed to make faster, confident decisions. Lead a smarter housing journey with Experian, and you can learn more at Experian.com slash mortgage. Robbie Chrisman In my numerous interviews around our industry, I've learned that mortgage manufacturing evolved through or around the need for people to collect documents, validate information, and manually move loans through sequential milestones. As trusted data sources, automation, and intelligent decisioning become more sophisticated, those assumptions deserve to be questioned. The objective shouldn't be to automate outdated workflows more efficiently, but rather to determine whether those workflows are still necessary in the first place. Innovation begins when organizations stop asking how technology can support existing processes and start asking whether those processes still represent the best way to manage risk. In my discussions with third-party providers of all shapes and sizes, I've learned that technology is no longer simply a collection of tools that replace manual work, becomes the enabler of better decisions, stronger confidence, and a more transparent borrower experience. Successful organizations are rethinking how work flows across the entire loan lifecycle rather than simply digitizing each individual step. Achieving that vision requires more than software, demands trusted data, thoughtful governance, effective change management, and a shared understanding of why new capabilities matter. I don't think that the future will be defined by who implements the most artificial intelligence or builds the longest list of digital features. My guess is that it will be defined by who's willing to challenge the assumptions that have shaped mortgage operations for decades and redesign the process around the opportunities that today's technology now makes possible. Mortgage-backed securities and Treasuries were essentially flat Thursday, with a quiet session giving way to modest late-day losses as rising oil prices weighed on bonds despite limited economic or geopolitical developments. The lack of movement was a bit of a surprise as markets were expected to remain volatile heading into today due to both geopolitical risks and Chair Warsh's closely watched Jackson Hole speech, where investors will look for clues on broader Fed reform, agenda, communication strategy, balance sheet policy, and most importantly, the outlook for September and subsequent rate decisions. Many think that he won't say anything of substance, but with September hike odds anywhere from 35 to 44%, depending on who you ask, Chair Warsh's Jackson Hole speech is a critical test of Fed credibility. He may reinforce the commitment to 2% inflation without offering forward guidance, while softer economic data gives him flexibility to refine the Fed's message. A more hawkish tone or payrolls revisions could trigger a sharp repricing, while dovish guidance could initially lift bonds but ultimately pressure the long end of the yield curve if it fuels inflation or policy uncertainty. The mortgage market is entering a period where policy changes may generate headlines without addressing the underlying affordability problem. FHFA Director Pulte is expected to announce changes to certain Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loan-level pricing adjustments and potentially mortgage credit score requirements. But the question remains whether either move will meaningfully reduce costs for borrowers. Changes to credit score reporting, in particular, do little to solve the fundamental problem of incomplete or inaccurate consumer data, while proposed government purchases of mortgage-backed securities are unlikely to materially lower mortgage rates if long-term Treasury yields remain elevated. Meanwhile, leadership upheaval at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac raises concerns about whether policymakers are focused enough on the operational risks facing the enterprises. For today's interview, I wanted to welcome to the show Figure's Alysse Guitar to talk about marketing, lending products in a digital environment where both trust and attention spans are waning. She's VP of Marketing and Growth at Figure, where she leads modern digital strategies and AI-driven customer engagement for financial products. She's helped facilitate billions in home equity line of credit originations and integrated advanced artificial intelligence tools to optimize marketing operations. Robbie Chrisman We are here to talk mortgage and marketing. Where is the intersection of those two things? We're going to start kind of broad here with you. Where do those two intersect in 2026? Alysse Guitar I mean, that's a great question. I think the most important thing, and not just in mortgage, but generally is the data. Like having good data can make a marketing program really strong. And I know a lot of mortgage companies have books of business, they have maybe a servicing portfolio. That's gold. So having first-party data is a game changer, no matter what you're marketing. But also the macro environment for mortgage specifically is always going to drive, you know, the story that you are putting out into the world. So that's really important to you. Like making sure you're meeting borrowers where they are. There's a lot of emotion in mortgage. You know, buying a home is is somebody's biggest purchase. So just making sure that you're not scaring people is also really important. Robbie Chrisman When we say first party data data, what does that mean? Extrapolating that out what is good data usage or the cutting edge usage of data versus what at this point is antiquated? It may be some marketing strategies that were cutting edge or relevant or useful as recently as pre-pandemic or right in the wake of it, they're now antiquated. Like what is the cutting edge of using data? Where does it lead in in terms of practical outputs? Alysse Guitar Totally. So anybody who does any marketing, even if you start a business from scratch, you can like buy data basically. Like if you run a Facebook ad and you use their data, that's third-party data. But if you're uploading your own list or if you're able to target your own customers like via email, that is all first-party data. So it's data that the business itself owns. It's their customers or their people, so to speak. As far as marketing strategies and what's on the cutting edge, being as targeted as possible is the cutting edge. And that's only going to get more and more important and necessary with AI. Ten years ago, the best that people could kind of do was what we would call like spray and pray, right? Like you have a database of a thousand people, you email them all, hey, would you like a mortgage today or whatever you're selling? And now you can get much more targeted and much more precise. AI is able to write a hundred different versions of an email much more quickly. And so you're able to increase your leverage and get more targeted, meet people where they are and be much more contextual. Um, and I think that's where the value is right now. Robbie Chrisman So are you saying that first party data is more valuable than third party data? Say it's the same data because in terms of the fields that you have, because people opted in when it's first party and they know and expect that. And third party, they're surprised and so they're mistrustful. Like, what's the value of first party data over third-party data? Alysse Guitar It's rarely apples to apples in the fields. Like you mentioned, like if it's the same with the fields, but like that's pretty rare that that's the case. First party data is also valuable because you you know the relevant things about them. I don't want to get too deep into you know what figure does, but like let's say we're talking about a t-shirt company, and you'll know, oh, this is the t-shirt they put in the cart that then they didn't buy. So you have these like relevant details about them. Whereas when you buy third-party data, it's really general. You're able to buy like t-shirt shoppers. And so the actual quality of the data is also much stronger if you're doing it right in your first party data. Robbie Chrisman I'm starting to think that companies are obviously getting way better about their data. Instagram, I stopped letting them listen in on my microphone because I was getting targeted ads for my conversations and it felt too invasive. However, because Instagram has access to my photos, I started getting targeted ads from my recent photos that I had taken. You take a photo of a hot tub and then suddenly you're getting spa ads. And so it's getting a lot better in terms of the collection, and maybe that I mean, obviously, that's going to help drive things forward for what companies are able to target. I've said for a long time that the mortgage industry has arguably the most valuable data of any consumer permission industry in terms of just the depth of information, the amount of information. Thoughts on the value there of all the data points the mortgage industry has. And I don't want to get dystopian and say, you know, is is the net is the future of mortgage profitability being able to sell that data out to other companies that could really use it. But what your thoughts on on where we are with the value of data that the mortgage industry specifically collects on borrowers. Alysse Guitar I think the value is also the greatest when it's your own. If I have data about my own customers, A, it's really contextual to our product. So it's already relevant. If you start selling data, it dilutes the value. You know, if you sell it to 100 people, that every time you sell it, it becomes less and less valuable. I'm a firm believer that data buying is built as a consumer, but as a marketer, it can get kind of gross and it's also just not as powerful as your first party data. If we were to buy, and of course we we do buy data, we buy Experian data. That's a thing that everybody does. But the power of what we do is we have this really great rich first-party data. And then when we do buy third-party data, it is also very rich. It's from good sources like Experian, and then we run data models on it. So it's it's just like much more valuable. To get kind of at the answer to your question, like, no, I don't think that the the future is selling data. I don't think that's the right, you know, both from a compliance standpoint, but just from like a value standpoint from a pure capitalistic standpoint. I don't think that's the future either. Robbie Chrisman Let's talk figure specifically. How does figure best leverage the data that it has to be able to maximize its productivity? Alysse Guitar Yeah. So I like I said, we have kind of two lanes. One, we do data modeling on prescreened offers. That's a big part of what we do. With our own first party data, though, like we've gotten much more complex in our targeting, in our messaging. And, you know, we're always testing things. And so we're able, we're always like, okay, we set it in this way, let's say it in a different way. Let's send it after six hours. And now we're gonna send it after seven hours. So with our emails, with our um SMS messages, with all of our lifecycle marketing, we're always testing to try to optimize those touch points. Robbie Chrisman When we think about the pendulum of tech can help me versus I love the creativity of a human. Where are we now in your estimation with marketing? Because yes, people can identify something is lacking human oversight or intervention or creativity pretty quickly. Now, I would venture to say that they're craving. I would I would guess that there's some cravings out there for human touch. You know, when when phone calls were first automated, or I call up an airline company, they thought it was the greatest thing since sliced bread that I they didn't have to let a human talk to me. That's a machine can handle. And then at some point, people just said zero, zero, zero, zero, or whatever, one, one, one until they got a human and they wanted that human. And I'm I'm wondering where you think we are now, because I would say people are craving a human, but also at the same time, technology is getting better to where I think it's going to seem more and more human. Alysse Guitar Oh, yeah. I think we're definitely in a state of flux. I've had experiences with AI that have been like really great, but ultimately nothing is gonna compare to sitting across from a human person and having that conversation. I mean, obviously, I think there's value in in both. I don't know where we are as a society, if that's the question you're asking. We're trying to find our way through this moment. Like we're in a very unique moment in history. It's very interesting. Robbie Chrisman At some point, my digital avatar will be able to interview your digital avatar, and there'll be so much content from both of us out there that it'll it'll just mimic both of us. I remember when there's a certain Tencent from China came out, and its AI videos were so good and realistic that I thought to myself, this is the end of reality as we know, and you and I are going down some a different a rabbit hole, and I'll I'll bring it back. But this is the end of the edit some of this out. No, no, no, I'm keeping it. This is the end of reality as we know it, because there already weren't what is accepted as the truth was already eroding for the last several years. A lot of that's from the political climate. If nothing is really true, then everything is possible. If if everything is possible, then the nothing is really true. And now with people being able to create these AI videos, who knows what's true and what's not if they look so real. Let's bring this back to marketing here, or I'll try. That sounds like a super exciting opportunity. What do you love so much about what you've been doing at Figure? What are you guys working on? And how's it tie in with kind of this frontier of brave new reality that we're existing in? Alysse Guitar I mean, we're doing a lot of really, really cool things. I just built my first odd co-work project just this week. So I'm I'm riding off of that high. Having a tool that's able to do research and synthesize things and um access different documents and surf the web and do all of those things is really cool and powerful. And again, able to give me more time to be creative and think about some of those things. We also have, you know, we do have an AI outbound voice agent that we've been working on. And that's been really impressive. And I actually, one of my favorite quotes was a borrower was on the phone with this AI. And, you know, where it's required, we do say, like, oh, I'm a virtual assistant, but you know, sometimes people don't hear that. So at the end of a 40-minute conversation that a person had with an AI, they go, Are you AI? And the agent says, Yes, I'm a virtual assistant. And they said, Wow, I am really impressed with you. And so we're starting to have some of these conversations and interact with AI in a way that is valuable and interesting. Um, and I do think that that's really cool. But at the end of the day, you know, it's not going to replace the importance of a human relationship either. So, you know, I maybe sit in between those two worlds. Robbie Chrisman Yeah. Less people will be pushing zero, zero, zero to talk to a human here here soon. Alysse Guitar I think so. Yeah. Robbie Chrisman When it comes to figure, more broadly speaking, the home equity space, there were a lot of PR hurdles for the space to get over. People had reluctance in using a home equity product when it's like, hey, you can get a much better rate doing this than a personal loan or some unsecured sort of lending instrument. Oh, well, they're taking my equity or they're gonna put a lien on my house. And it wasn't all these evils that people made it out to be, or people were making it out to be thoughts on overcoming these barriers, and and maybe this is this meant more broadly for the mortgage industry because I there have been studies as recently as last quarter, people still think you need to put 20% down to get into a house. The overwhelming majority, people don't know about down payment assistance, people don't know about all these other programs. So there's just a lack of awareness, and and obviously the home equity space, you've had to deal with that. How do we get better awareness of these products and just how helpful they can be for people? Alysse Guitar Absolutely. I think um, I mean, just a funny story. When I first started at Figure, which was back in 2018, um, whenever we would like post on Facebook, the responses would always be people on their soapbox, don't ever get at home equity line. Don't, it's like a credit card for your house. Uh, it's so bad. And, you know, for us, we're a firm believer that uh, you know, sort of the education piece, like a rising tide with sell boats, um, which obviously, you know, we have a lot of partners who are using our home equity line. And I don't, I don't know if we would be there without some of the foundational work we've done in educating consumers. And one of the things that we, to your point, like to emphasize is that, you know, if you are a homeowner and you're looking at a personal loan, you will get a better rate if you just get a home equity line of credit. Like it's just a fact. And if they say, Oh, well, I'll lose my house if I'm not gonna, if I don't repay it, and it's like, well, are you gonna pay it? Then they're like, yes. And then great, you just get a better rate. You're saving money. So a lot of education, a lot of we do a ton of real consumer stories, and I think that's really helpful too. Uh, and just, you know, we have a ton of success stories, and so we just emphasize those. And I think people, it counted to the AI conversation. People like hearing from people, and so that's doing a lot of the best marketing for us is sharing our customer stories. Robbie Chrisman People like hearing from people, and I like hearing from you. This was a true pleasure. Very glad to have time, and uh, hopefully we'll do this again soon. Alysse Guitar Sounds great. Robbie Chrisman The U.S. Treasury completed this week's note auction slate with a good $44 billion seven-year note offering, with demands slightly better than the recent average. A two and a half bid to cover ratio means investors submitted $2.50 of bids for every $1 of Treasuries offered versus a 2.48 recent average. However, demand from indirect buyers, typically foreign institutions and large asset managers, was notably weaker at 61%, while direct buyers stepped up strongly to 27%, suggesting domestic investors absorbed more of the issue than usual. Aside from the events in Jackson Hole, today sees a light economic calendar, which kicks off later this morning with August Chicago PMI, expected to decline marginally from the prior reading. After that brings final August University of Michigan consumer sentiment, which is expected to be unchanged. Year-ahead inflation expectations, part of that release will be scrutinized. We'll be in the day with agency MBS prices and therefore mortgage rates, little change from Thursday's close, the two-year yielding 4.23, and the 10-year yielding 4.69 after closing yesterday at 4.67%. Let's wrap up with a joke and some housekeeping. A buddy of mine was telling me about his new hobby of photographing salmon in different outfits. Apparently, it's just like shooting fish in apparel. Sponsor Thanks to Experian for sponsoring this week's podcasts. From lenders and landlords to employers and consumers, Experian helps connect the lending ecosystem with data and insights needed to make faster, confident decisions. Lead a smarter housing journey with Experian, and you can learn more at Experian.comslash mortgage.