Cycle time: The key to a more efficient business

If you aren't monitoring each phase of the mortgage process, you won't know where potential problems are

Cycle time: The key to a more efficient business

On the April 26 episode of my Lykken on Lending podcast, we had the opportunity to have John Maynell of Motivity Solutions come on to briefly share a fundamental key performance indicator for the mortgage industry. This week, John talked about the importance of cycle time.

Cycle time is a measure of how long each step in the mortgage process takes. If you aren't monitoring each phase of the process, then you can't possibly know where the problems lie. Keeping track of how quickly loans move through each step can help you know which areas need more training or perhaps even more personnel.

Cycle time is all about efficiency. The shorter your cycles, the more you can produce. Monitoring the time spent at each step and the transition time between hand-offs can give you a feel for what needs improvement. Sometimes, success comes down to simply shaving off a minute hear and there. Those minutes add up and, over time, become an increased number of closed loans in your average month. Are you keeping track of your cycle times? You can't know what needs improvement if you aren't measuring it in the first place.