Real Estate
Home›Real Estate›Mortgages›Optimal Blue’s Virtual Economist forecasts rates and m…
Optimal Blue’s Virtual Economist forecasts rates and mortgage lock volume
The AI tool draws on public economic data and Optimal Blue’s lock data covering more than 35% of U.S. mortgage locks.
HousingWire reports that Optimal Blue is rolling out its Virtual Economist, an AI- and machine learning-powered forecasting tool aimed at helping mortgage capital markets teams analyze interest rates and mortgage lock volume under different macroeconomic scenarios.
At HousingWire's AI Summit in Dallas, Kevin Foley said the model combines public economic data with Optimal Blue’s proprietary mortgage lock volume data, which represents more than 35% of U.S. mortgage locks. The tool generates forecasts for interest rates and market volume and supports scenario runs tied to inputs including the 10-year Treasury, mortgage-backed securities spreads, and the primary-secondary spread.
Foley said the product is meant to help lenders plan for changing conditions and make more informed business decisions, positioning the value of AI in part around adding a company’s institutional context to improve how the model solves mortgage industry problems.
He also cautioned lenders to monitor token spending and plan for usage-based API pricing and human review as they adopt AI capabilities, according to HousingWire.