HMA Mortgage has grown to roughly 300 employees and 50-plus branches across about 35 states funding around 500 loans a month — all run through a four-person accounting team. Before Loan Vision, HMA’s books ran on AMB, a system that had already been in place for years by the time CFO Matt Stokes joined. He gave it a real chance — about a year — before concluding it couldn’t do what the business needed.
“I’m trying not to say awful things about our old system, but it was just too convoluted. Getting the data in and the processes that it took were overly complicated.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
The system was manual by default — “no automations,” as Matt put it —and the vendor’s promises didn’t match what showed up.
“They kept telling us that they were going to invest and improve the platform and there was a new version, but we never saw any results.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
The clearest proof point of the drag: a month-end close that routinely took 20 to 25 days to finish.
Matt isn’t new to this decision. Before HMA, he spent 17 years at Amcap Mortgage, and he was part of the team that brought Loan Vision in there after cycling through a couple of earlier solutions. So, when HMA’s old system kept falling short, Matt didn’t run a new evaluation — he already knew the capabilities that his team needed to be successful.
“I went straight to Loan Vision. I knew the solution well, and I knew it solved for everything we were trying to get to.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
Asked directly what it would take to make him move again at a brand-new company still running the old system, his answer was immediate:
“It would be an immediate switch.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
Matt is a repeat Loan Vision customer — a pattern Loan Vision is seeing more of as finance leaders change companies — and when asked what makes the solution easy to choose again, he went straight to the mortgage-specific depth:
“It’s more mortgage specific — it understands that everything needs to be loan level, branch level, division level. It understands the makeup of the mortgage industry.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
The clearest before/after in the interview: a month-end close that took 20–25 days on the old system now takes 10.
“I’m down to 10 days.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
HMA runs its entire accounting function — for ~300 employees, 50-plus branches, and roughly 500 loans a month — with four people. Matt was direct about not wanting that number to grow:
“I’m probably running the skinniest team you’ve ever seen. I’ve got four people … I don’t plan on growing it anymore. We’re going to use automation and AI to take us further.”
— Matt Stoks, CFO, HMA Mortgage
Automated funding and purchase-advice processing is a big part of how that holds up:
“It allows me to carry one person in AP, which is tremendous, especially for the size we are and the amount of AP we process.”
“It allows me to have one person overseeing, making sure that everything’s going correctly, as opposed to one person having to enter hundreds of separate entries. That’s a huge pickup.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
With 50-plus branch managers in the field, the Branch Portal lets them self-serve instead of routing every question back to the four-person team:
“The drill down makes it really easy — they can go in and look on a loan-level basis what commissions were paid. That really does make it a lot easier when dealing with branch managers.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
Matt also leans on dimensional reporting — branch, division, department, loan officer — directly with the board and partners. The ability to pull reports and easily dive into the metrics that catch his eye are a key feature to his process and is foundational to his success. When asked how he would operate with the loan level details, he responded:
“It would be impossible if I didn’t have the drill-down capability. I would quit.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
Matt was part of the Luna test group and is looking at Luna 2.0 as the next lever for keeping his team at three people as HMA keeps growing:
“I’m very excited where Luna is going. I was on the test cases for it, and I’m super excited.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
When asked to sum up his reason for choosing Loan Vision — again — in a word or two, Matt responded:
“Automation, mortgage knowledge, mortgage specific, and just overall, you all are keeping up with technology. That’s what we require nowadays.”
— Matt Stokes, CFO, HMA Mortgage
A quality mortgage solution looks at the industry trends and builds along with them. Loan Vision has continued to grow capabilities that enable a lean team to operate efficiently without worrying about how to handle rapidly scaling loan volume.
Gain unparalleled efficiency, compliance, and insights with Loan Vision. Begin your journey with us today.
