CEO Michael Franco Discusses How Lenders Can Scale Amid Rate Challenges

As interest rates remain elevated, mortgage market participants are seeking new ways to expand in 2025. SitusAMC Chief Executive Officer Michael Franco recently appeared on MPA TV and spoke with News Editor Fergal McAlinden about how SitusAMC is helping mortgage lenders scale amid the challenges of higher rates.

“We're helping people get into new markets and do it right, so they can grow their business,” Franco said. “We really partner with clients to help them execute on the entirety of their business strategy -- from originating to selling loans, to managing existing positions, to selling MSRs, to valuing assets. We're a more holistic provider, and because of that, we tend to be very partner-focused and client-centric in our business delivery. We're really looking at this as a long-term client relationship.” 

Comprehensive Support: Originations & Secondary Market  

Franco discussed how SitusAMC’s expertise is well-known in the secondary markets, where the firm has supported 625 securitizations over the last three years, covering about 400,000 loans. But SitusAMC has more recently expanded into the primary market, offering licensed underwriting, knowledge process outsourcing, component services, title search and pre-close reviews to facilitate the sale of loans into the secondary market, he noted.  

“For institutions that may not be used to originating loans going to secondary market executions, and are used to selling to the GSEs, it can be a different experience,” Franco explained. “We walk them through how to really originate these loans, do it compliantly, and make sure that it's going to get bought, and not get a scratch-and-dent execution at the end of the day." 

Tech-Enabled Offering 

On the technology side, Franco highlighted key systems including ComplianceEase, which vetted more than two million loans last year; and the ProMerit and WLS warehouse systems, which facilitate lending between banking institutions and non-banks, and currently have more than $125 billion in commitments outstanding. In addition, SitusAMC recently formed a strategic partnership with Candor Technology, integrating its tools into SitusAMC’s fulfillment services to provide a unique solution. The firm is exploring other potential FinTech partnerships, Franco said. 

The Leader in Third-Party Review 

Franco also discussed the ways SitusAMC supports secondary-market activity through third-party review (TPR) on both a pre-sale or a pre-purchase basis, and due diligence for private label securitization. These reviews, which are often mandated by larger institutions, cover areas such as compliance, credit, collateral, data integrity and more. SitusAMC is also the leading valuer of mortgage servicing rights, valuing $7 trillion in MSRs on a monthly basis.  

"We also have a number of technology offerings — a rate lock system which is a conduit management platform, helping people manage all their different sellers,” Franco said. He highlighted other key technologies, including:   

• Acuity, a document management, classification and data extraction platform; 
• SBO, a loan accounting and servicing oversight platform; 
• eMBTRUST, a document custody system which manages roughly 80% of custodial records; 
• and Centricity, a secondary market data management platform.   

“What really sets us apart is the size, scale and depth of our organization,” Franco said. “We're a market leader in most of the areas that we play in. There's just so many things that we touch, from the primary markets to the secondary markets.” 

Watch the MPA TV interview here.