The mortgage industry has always prized the hustle. The most successful loan officers (LOs) are those with the motivation and self-direction to relentlessly chase leads, manage relationships, and close deals—and the ingenuity to develop their own best practices. Those qualities remain essential. But in today’s market, mortgage lenders can’t afford to treat their LOs as lone-wolf salespeople. That conventional model doesn’t just limit growth—it actively undermines it.

Fragmentation is a real problem for lenders, and the lone wolf model isn’t making it any easier. Individual excellence isn’t enough when data is disconnected, messaging is inconsistent, and decisions get made in silos. Meanwhile, LOs can (understandably) over-rotate toward short-term wins, while the bigger opportunities—building long-term relationships and sustainable growth—get lost in the noise.

What lenders need now is alignment, visibility, and unification. They need a way to turn one-time borrowers into lifelong customers. And that starts by getting everyone on the same page—and the same platform.

Why lone-wolf lending fails

When LOs are left to figure things out on their own, the result is predictable: they optimize for what they can control. They chase leads. They close loans. And they do it all with whatever tools and processes they’re most comfortable with.

This approach is serviceable for the individual LO. But when you scale that to dozens or hundreds of LOs—each working in isolation—issues quickly emerge:

• No shared customer insight. Everyone’s working from their own spreadsheets, contact lists, or partial CRM views.

• No coordinated engagement. Borrowers get wildly different experiences depending on which LO they’re working with.

• No long-term strategy. Because LOs are buried in day-to-day deals, there’s no time—or incentive—to nurture relationships that might pay off months or years down the road.

The result? Short-term gains that cause long-term stagnation. Without a coordinated strategy, you end up with isolated efforts that fail to make a lasting impact. And the moment the market shifts, lenders are left scrambling. Those once-shiny wins quickly become embarrassing monuments to short-sighted tactics.

A seamless platform provides limitless visibility

So, what’s the answer? The most important change is giving your team a common foundation to work from—and that comes down to choosing the right technology. Centralizing customer data and engagement on a single platform can change how your business functions at all levels:

It unifies the customer experience. Everyone’s drawing from the same source of truth, so your borrowers get a consistent message and a more personal, relevant journey—no matter which LO they’re working with.

• It gives LOs insight they can actually use. A centralized view reveals not just who’s ready to do business today, but who’s showing long-term intent signals—credit checks, property listings, life events—and who’s worth nurturing over time.

• It boosts efficiency and productivity. Automating outreach, follow-up, and lead prioritization frees LOs to focus on what they do best: building trust, closing deals, and deepening relationships.

• It creates a real growth engine. With shared data and a scalable engagement strategy, you can stop scrambling and start building a system that can grow predictably and sustainably, even when the market gets choppy.

LO adoption: where most tech implementations go wrong

Of course, tech on its own won’t fix anything. If LOs don’t use the platform, you’re back to square one.  

This is a big hurdle in the lending world, where there’s very real inertia to change. Most LOs aren’t eager to change what’s already working for them. If a new tool or platform just feels like it will add extra work, they’ll ignore it—leaving your new solution to collect dust and your investment or time and money largely wasted.

This is why solving the adoption problem needs to be part of your strategy from the start. And while it’s a serious issue, there are three key steps to mitigate it:

1. Keep it simple. Give your LOs tools and dashboards that surface what matters most—who to call, when to follow up, what’s driving intent—without forcing them to dig or overwhelming them with features and functions they won’t ever use.

2. Show, don’t tell. Help them connect the dots between using the platform and hitting their numbers. If it helps them close faster, follow up smarter, or get more repeat business, they’ll at least be willing to try. As the saying goes: “You can lead a horse to water…”

3. Support them like it matters. Training should be hands-on and tailored, not a one-time webinar. This is just as much your vendor’s responsibility as it is yours. Make sure you vet any vendor’s ability to commit to successful implementation.

The extent to which you follow these three steps will go a long way in determining whether you see ROI on your tech investment.  

You can’t scale in infinite directions

Every lending organization has LOs who go above and beyond; LOs who lag behind, and LOs who simply meet expectations. And lone wolves permeate all three groups; following their own roadmap, chasing any opportunity they find, and hindering the organization’s larger growth strategy. That’s why organizations structured this way find it impossible to scale.  

Now, imagine if you could have tech that elevates every LO to the same high-performing level. By aligning your entire sales organization on a single platform that helps them work more efficiently, your good LOs will continue to produce, but now your struggling and middle-of-the-road LOs can level up—allowing leaders and platform administrators to spend less time reigning in lone wolves and more time supporting the pack.  

Wolves hunt better in packs  

LOs will always be at the front line of your lending operation. But treating them like individual agents instead of coordinated players in a unified strategy is holding your business back.

By moving to a shared platform and getting serious about adoption, you set your organization up for something far more valuable than short-term wins. You build a system that gets smarter over time and nurtures every relationship—not just the ones that close quickly. You also strengthen the resilience of your business, setting it up for growth no matter how the market moves or how your organization evolves.

Total Expert has been recognized as the Mortgage CRM Leader in G2’s 2025 Summer Report. As the tech industry’s leading resource for user-generated software reviews, earning a “Leader” ranking from G2 is a huge accolade—especially in an industry where everyone claims to have the best tools and most innovative technology.

This is the 15th consecutive quarter that Total Expert has been recognized as the category leader, but that wouldn’t be possible without our incredible customers who use our platform every day. Your support, feedback, and passion help us continue to build the most innovative customer engagement platform in the financial services industry!

How are G2 rankings calculated?

G2 reviews are submitted by real users with first-hand experience using the software and platforms they’re reviewing and aggregated by G2 to determine category leaders. G2 defines a Mortgage CRM as “tailored software that understands the intricacies of the mortgage industry, and its purpose is to ease the daily responsibilities of loan officers.” Products shown on G2’s Grid® for Mortgage CRM are ranked by customer satisfaction (based on user reviews) and market presence (based on market share, seller size, and social impact).

According to G2: “The Grid® represents the democratic voice of real software users, rather than the subjective opinion of one analyst. G2 rates products from the Mortgage CRM category algorithmically based on data sourced from product reviews shared by G2 users and data aggregated from online sources and social networks.”

G2 Grid® for Mortgage CRM Software

Being recognized as a G2 category leader is a huge deal to everyone at Total Expert. But not because we get to post about it on LinkedIn. It’s important because it tells us that what we’re doing is working, that the platform we’re building is helping people, and that all the hard work we put in is paying off. So, thank you to everyone who has submitted a review, sent us feedback, and helped us continue to create the best platform that we can!

What are G2 users saying?

★★★★★ “The team is very client-centric and is always available to deliver amazing customer service.” – Jonathan E. |  Read review

★★★★★ “Total Expert allows us to communicate with our membership directly and strategically motivate our members towards products and services that will benefit them directly. No more generic emails to large groups. Precise communication is key.” Lesli B. | Read review

★★★★★ “The platform allows us to leverage marketing solutions without the need to involve our entire marketing dept. We are able to move when the market moves and ensure our message is relevant.” Verified User in Banking | Read review

★★★★★ “Total Expert allows us to market to all of our members belonging to our credit union as well as any potential leads our loan officers are working with. From campaigns to emails & flyers. Everything we need is at our fingertips. Not to mention the customer intelligence side of things which is a super underrated tool that helps our loan officers immensely.” Carlos J. | Read review

★★★★★ “It’s helping me bridge the gap in my communication/marketing to potential clients, particularly the ones who I have not yet been able to get in contact with. Getting and keeping them engaged helps to increase both my contact rate and conversion. This results in more pre-approvals and refinance loans.” Mac V. | Read review

Get the full, unbiased story

The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed H.R. 2808, also known as the Homebuyers Privacy Protection Act (HPPA), which is designed to curb the abusive practice of “trigger leads.” The House and Senate still need to reconcile the bill before final approval (we fully expect it to pass), but the mortgage industry is already buzzing about how this might limit prospecting and lead generation strategies.

Total Expert already gives our customers fine-grained controls to comply with this proposed legislation. The HPPA only affirms the relationship-driven strategies already proven by leading lenders—the kind Total Expert was built to enable and enhance.

Here’s everything you need to know about this proposed legislation:

What is the “trigger leads” ban?

Trigger leads occur when a consumer applies for a mortgage, triggering an inquiry to a credit reporting agency (CRA), which then sells that consumer’s contact information to other lenders—often without that consumer’s knowledge or explicit consent. The lenders that purchase these trigger leads then use them for lead generation campaigns. For the consumer, this often means a barrage of unwanted calls, texts, and emails.

HPPA would to restrict the sale and use of these trigger leads, prohibiting CRAs from selling (or otherwise “furnishing”) consumer reports related to residential mortgage transactions—with a few key exceptions.

The larger goals are to protect consumer privacy and reduce predatory practices that undermine trust. The more immediate goal is to ensure that consumers applying for a mortgage aren’t immediately subjected to a deluge of unsolicited offers from unknown lenders that mislead borrowers and create significant confusion.  

What is permitted under the proposed law?

As currently written, HPPA leaves room for trigger leads to be purchased and leveraged by lenders if they fit into one or more of the following categories:

• The lender has originated the current residential mortgage loan of the consumer to whom the consumer report relates

• The lender is the servicer of a current residential mortgage loan of the consumer to whom the consumer report relates

• The lender is an insured depository institution or credit union AND holds a current account for the consumer to whom the consumer report relates.  

• The lender has obtained consent from the consumer and can provide documentation of such consent to a credit agency if needed.

The common theme here is that these are all situations where the lender has either an existing business relationship with the consumer or has received explicit consent from the consumer to be monitored by the lender.

What does HPPA mean for Total Expert customers?

We built the Total Expert platform to help our customers make more genuine human connections and build authentic, lasting relationships. No good relationship ever started with unwanted badgering, so fully respecting consumer consent and privacy was a foundational priority from Day 1 at Total Expert.

More to the point, we designed the Total Expert platform to balance automation with granular control—to make sure you’re talking to the right people at the right time. Our built-in safeguards already prioritize responsible engagement. These controls ensure you’re only engaging with individuals with whom you have an existing relationship, or those who have explicitly opted into communications from you. This means:

• You’re focusing on truly high-value opportunities. You can use Total Expert to identify and nurture leads where a foundation of trust or clear interest already exists.

• You’re deepening existing relationships. You can lean on Total Expert’s Customer Intelligence and journey orchestration to engage your members and customers with relevant, timely offers, rather than endlessly chasing cold leads.  

• You’re building trust, not jeopardizing it. By respecting privacy and giving you insights and tools to engage thoughtfully, we’re helping you reinforce your brand reputation and foster trust that defines long-term loyalty.

What’s next?

We’re closely monitoring the status of the HPPA. We will continue to support our customers in navigating and complying with any new requirements that emerge as part of this proposed legislation. We’re committed to giving you the tools and guidance you need.

But in a broader sense, this legislation doesn’t change the best practices we’ve always preached. And it shouldn’t change the relationship-driven strategies our customers have developed through the Total Expert platform. Instead, this is a clear signal to double down on engaging with precision, relevance, and (above all) genuine respect for your customers and members. That’s how you win customers for life!