Mortgage's Transfer Portal Is Here

The mortgage industry has spent the past decade digitizing lead generation, marketing, pricing, underwriting & servicing. Yet recruiting remains surprisingly analog. It’s still dominated by phone calls, recruiter relationships, desperate AF LinkedIn DMs & cajoling over surf-and-turf.

A new startup is betting that originators want something different: an experience that’s a bit more Tinder 💕 than traditional matchmaking. More privacy, more transparency & more control over how they evaluate opportunities.

In this edition of The Mortgage Scoop, we’ll dive into the modern recruiting marketplace. We’ll also break down Victor Ciardelli selling saunas, cold plunges, yoga pants & mortgages. Plus, a $100M team leaves Movement, fresh stats on refi originations, a poll on whether I should buy my son an Oscar Meyer Weinermobile for his birthday & more!

Purchase money production accounted for 57.0% of new agency securitizations, down from 62.5% in Q4 '25 and 76.3% in Q1 '25, as refinance mortgage production continued to gain market share. The market share for purchase money production is at its lowest level since Q2'22.

The decrease in mortgage interest rates in Q4 '25 and into the first two months of Q1 '26 has supported the continued increase in refinance activity. Rate/term refinances represented 31.5% of new loans in Q1'26, compared to 26.7% in Q4 '25 and 11.2% in Q1 '25. Meanwhile, cash-out refinances rose slightly to 11.6% of new loans, compared to 10.8% in Q4 '25 and 12.5% in Q1 '25.

Of those lenders issuing at least $1 billion in Q1 '26 (excluding builders and housing finance agencies), Cornerstone Capital Bank had the highest percentage purchase of their total production (90.4% of issuance) followed by PrimeLending (75.9%) and Rate (73.8%).

Of those lenders issuing at least $1 billion in Q1 '26, Provident Funding had the highest percentage rate/term refinance of their total production (50.7% of issuance) followed by A&D Mortgage (42.5%) and Citibank (29.3%).

Of those lenders issuing at least $1 billion in Q1 '26, loanDepot had the highest percentage cash-out refinance production of their total production (26.9% of issuance) followed by Rocket (26.9%) and Wells Fargo (22.5%).

This report is brought to you by Milliman. Milliman provides strategic and quantitative consulting services across the mortgage market with expertise in origination, servicing and capital investment.

Source: Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae MBS Data Disclosure

Athleisure wear appears to be just one component of Victor Ciardelli’s other retail focus. Rate apparently also has an outdoor furniture & spa brand called Rate Outdoors. As I mentioned on Monday, I’ll be doing some Hot Boy Summer 🏖 modeling/product reviews of various Rate Fit items later this month. But I’ll need to sell a lot more subscriptions to The Mortgage Scoop to afford the Rate Outdoors items. An $83K sauna, good lord!

I’m a bit fuzzy on whether this is an elaborate passion project for Ciardelli, or if it’s some kind of customer acquisition play… or how a mortgage business can coexist naturally w/ lifestyle retail goods & wellness initiatives. Anyway, if you want a discount code on some yoga pants hit me up!

Ellen Duncan, a former fractional CMO at AnnieMac, wants to replace cold calls & fat recruiter fees. Ten weeks ago, she launched the beta version of mLOOP, a recruiting platform designed to match originators & lenders using a compatibility model.

"The mortgage industry needs the NCAA transfer portal," Duncan told The Mortgage Scoop.

I really dig the analogy! Anyway, Duncan's solution is an anonymous marketplace where LOs create profiles detailing their production, business model, technology preferences, support needs & career goals. Lenders build corresponding profiles describing comp structures, products, culture, leadership style & operational capabilities.

Unlike LinkedIn, neither side immediately sees the other's identity. An originator can browse opportunities anonymously & choose if/when to reveal themselves. Only after both parties express interest does the platform facilitate a direct introduction.

Mortgage recruiting remains heavily relationship-driven, but it's also super inefficient. Recruiters can command placement fees ranging from $15K to $30K or more for top producers. (Some third-party recruiters are higher retainer, lower override & some are no retainer, super high override.) Discovery trips, executive travel & thousands of recruiting calls add additional costs.

Duncan’s startup is still very much in beta mode (a bigger release is coming later this month). mLoop has signed up 10 lenders & maintains an interest list of 500+ LOs (30+ have onboarded). The lender mix includes IMBs, brokers & depositories (AnnieMac is not among them, in case you are wondering). Duncan says mLoop has already facilitated its first lender-LO introductions, although no completed placements have occurred yet.

That’s not surprising —> I hear that recruiting cycles these days are typically 9 months or longer. Duncan's current beta structure charges lenders a one-time platform fee & an $8K success fee when a matched originator joins within a 12-month window.

IMO, whether the concept ultimately succeeds will depend less on technology & more on classic network effects. Mortgage is still one of the most old school, relationship-driven businesses out there. LOs/branch/regional managers often move b/c of a pre-existing relationship at the new shop, and/or can verify what those recruiters/execs are saying w/ past colleagues. Still, it’s worth remembering that more marriages today start on Tinder than they do at the local bar…

Speaking of recruiting, I talked to a few divisionals & regionals on the front lines. Here’s what they said about the current state of mortgage recruiting & who's spending big to land originators.