BuildFax and DataVerify have announced a partnership to help lenders meet the property improvement validation requirements outlined in the Uniform Appraisal Dataset (UAD), offering a completely automated solution for validation of property improvements. BuildFax data provides crucial improvement information which is fundamental to new lending standards and required for compliance with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac’s Uniform Appraisal Dataset (UAD). Before BuildFax, lenders had no easy way to determine whether a structure’s claimed improvements were properly assessed, overestimated, or fraudulent. With BuildFax, lenders can quickly assess appraisal quality, potential illegal flips, and overall collateral risk.
"Fueled by continued economic uncertainty and unemployment, mortgage fraud is on the rise and remains something which lenders must continually guard against,” said Kent Johnson, vice president of DataVerify. “Innovative resources, of which BuildFax’s Property History Intelligence shines as a top-tier example, are a strong complement to DataVerify’s strategy of delivering products that provide lenders with the critical insight they need to lend safely.”
DataVerify reports that, in the last 90 days, 387 lenders have adopted the Property Improvements Intelligence Reports of BuildFax through DataVerify’s industry-leading enterprise-wide risk mitigation platform known as DRIVE. The addition of BuildFax data has provided DRIVE system users with access to differentiated data assets, including property improvement history and the related value of those improvements. Such comprehensive information gives lenders greater insight into collateral risk, which enables them to review, process, and confidently approve mortgage applications in a faster, more efficient manner.
“The DRIVE system is the perfect application for BuildFax’s game-changing property intelligence,” said Holly Tachovsky, president of BuildFax. “While regulations and economic malaise are making lending tougher, BuildFax is providing solutions to make lending decisions easier and smarter. And with HUD and FHA having extended the deadlines for UAD compliance until January 2012, even more lenders now have time to integrate BuildFax data into their processes.”
