Elio’s founders are using AI to remove repetitive work, preserve the human relationship, and give loan officers the support of an IMB with broker-level economics.
Why does the status quo still reign supreme? Because the mortgage industry has a bad habit of running in place.
We take a broken process, add another piece of software, give people another login, and pretend that we are making a real impact. I know because I did it, and I can tell you nothing changed.
The process stays the same, right? The people doing the work still chase conditions, update the systems… and maybe copy the same information into multiple places? As you work through our chaotic world, you have to hold the entire operation together through memory, email, and a collection of half-connected tools.
We made the bad process faster. Sweet!
That is why this conversation with the founders of Elio Mortgage on The Broker Journey was so much fun…and refreshing.
Elio, who just made their big announcement, recently came out of stealth with a big idea: Build an AI-native mortgage company from the ground up instead of forcing new technology into an old operating model.
Elio isn’t going after the low-hanging fruit of what AI does (like most vendors). Elio is going after the entire mortgage manufacturing process.
They are 100% singing my song and in my humble opinion, that’s the problem AI needs to solve.
Enter The Outsiders (They Saw the Problem Differently)
Elio co-founders Oren and Arad came into mortgage from outside the industry.
Oren spent years working in artificial intelligence, including time as an AI researcher at Microsoft and on the early Microsoft-OpenAI collaboration. Arad came from investment banking and real estate private equity, with experience at Deutsche Bank and KKR.
They were looking for an industry where AI could create real business value while making humans more effective. Mortgage checked every box.
“It is a massive market. The consumer experience is frustrating. The value chain is fragmented. The cost to originate a loan is more than it should be. And the industry continues throwing human capital at repetitive work whenever volume increases.”
Sounds like the mortgage industry to me!
Their outside perspective became more useful when they met Steven, a broker owner who knows exactly where the opportunities are in the process. They met at AIME fuse in 2025 and spent roughly 10 hours together mapping out the vision and talking through how a brokerage could operate differently.
Steven brought the industry experience. Oren and Arad brought the beginner’s mindset.
That combo matters because people in any industry get used to how work gets done. We stop questioning the process and start looking for ways to improve pieces of it.
My question has always been this. Why make a bad process better when you can rebuild the damn thing?
That is what I mean when I say, different first, better second.
A Mortgage Is a Manufacturing Process
I have always described mortgage origination as manufacturing.
A loan moves down an assembly line. People gather information, review documents, validate details, clear conditions, update systems, and hand the file to the next person. Every handoff creates another chance for delay, complexity, or human error.
Most mortgage companies respond to growth by adding people. More volume means more processors, more assistants, more ops, probably more managers, and more people responsible for keeping the machine moving. Then volume drops, and companies shoot those people out of cannon so they can cut bait ASAP.
Hire fast, fire fast… rinse and repeat.
The first thing Elio did was map every step a broker takes to originate a loan; they believe their technology can remove as much as 70% of the backend work that eats up an originator’s day, and Steve, as a seasoned LO, agrees.
A day could easily be eaten up by collecting and reading documents, mapping conditions, searching guidelines, updating systems, organizing follow-up, and moving information between tools.
Oren’s thesis is that it all starts with owning your data and the systems. Elio built its own LOS and CRM, borrower intelligence, pricing, lender guidelines, and AI agents that work other parts of the process. Owning the data layer lets those systems work together instead of forcing the loan officer to be the connection between them.
For example, the Elio application can adjust its questions based on previous answers. If the borrower says they are a first-time homebuyer, the system does not waste time asking about other properties they own. Uploaded documents can be read, matched to conditions, and checked before the file reaches the loan officer.
In mortgage, loan officers have become the intelligence engine for their own businesses. They remember who needs a call, which guideline may work, where a document belongs, what changed in the file, and what happens next.
Every minute spent acting as the system is a minute taken away from building relationships, creating opportunities, advising borrowers, and bringing in more loans.
Give the Loan Officer Leverage
At Elio, the goal is to make the loan officer the “air traffic controller.”
The technology handles work behind the scenes. The loan officer reviews, approves, advises, and stays in control of the relationship and the book of business.
Their model is designed to provide three things: economics, support, and leverage.
Elio wants to give loan officers the support they expect from an IMB, including marketing, compliance, legal, licensing, operations, coaching, and technology, while preserving the flexibility and economics that attract people to the broker channel.
The current model takes 50 basis points from each transaction with no separate LOS, CRM, sponsorship, or platform fees charged to the loan officer. Elio says it covers credit report costs, pays weekly, and provides an LOA for producers who reach $15 million in annual volume without changing their compensation structure.
They want to keep it simple and build right in the middle where they feel LOs are ready for something different that just isn’t another variation of the same model.
That is the bet Elio is making.
Now They Have to Prove It
Their vision is ambitious. Building a mortgage company is hard business, and this industry is not for the weak. Building the technology that runs the mortgage company at the same time is even harder.
Elio will have to prove that its technology works when loan volume grows, files get ugly, guidelines change, and hundreds of loan officers use the system in ways nobody predicted. It will also have to preserve the collaboration and speed that exist when a company is young.
I loved hearing Oren talk about his fear of losing the beginner’s mindset. The mortgage industry will teach you, but it will also try to pull you back toward the same systems, roles, and “answers.”
Elio’s founders know that. They are bringing loan officers, engineers, product leaders, and operators into the same room to build and test the process together, which shows they understand that the people doing the work need a voice in how the system gets built.
I believe that Elio is trying to solve the right problem.
At the end of the day, loan officers are paid to originate loans. Their value is earning trust, guiding clients, building referral relationships, and building their book of business. The administrative work became part of the job because the industry never built a better way to handle it.
Elio is trying to build that better way to create the ultimate win-win.
I was really impressed with the team, and full disclosure, I have taken them and their LOs on as coaching clients. I am excited to see what they build from up close.
Connect with the leaders:
Oren Michaely, CEO
Arad Lev Ari, COO
Steven Carey, Chief Brokerage Officer
Elio Mortgage