Maintaining personalized service during national expansion
In a financial environment characterized by fluctuating interest rates and increasing competition from digital-native lenders, non-QM lending provides critical options for borrowers who don't fit conventional criteria. NQM Funding recognized that building and maintaining trusted high-touch broker relationships would be essential to achieving their mission of becoming a national leader in this specialized market.
"When I joined, we were a small team with big ambitions," says Franz Becker, CRM Manager at NQM Funding. "We wanted to be a national lender offering diverse non-QM mortgage products through a flexible, relationship-based approach. But our systems weren't ready for that scale."
The company faced several fundamental challenges:
- Their legacy loan origination system was rigid and complex, making it difficult to extract data or track customer interactions
- Account executives worked in silos, managing relationships through individual calls, emails and manual processes
- Marketing efforts were disconnected from sales activities
- There was no unified view of broker communications or engagement.
"At that time, we had about 5,000 companies in our database but no effective way to build relationships at scale," explains Becker. "Today, we manage over 100,000 contacts, with 50,000 actively engaged in our marketing programs.”
“In the non-QM space, brokers need partners who can move quickly and handle complex scenarios. We couldn't deliver that consistently without better systems and processes."
Unifying teams and technology for growth
When evaluating solutions, NQM Funding initially considered a mortgage-specific CRM platform. However, Becker soon recognized that HubSpot's flexibility would better serve their unique wholesale lending approach.
"We gave ourselves three weeks to see if HubSpot could deliver everything our sales team needed," says Becker. "While I had extensive CRM experience, I was new to HubSpot and had to learn its capabilities quickly. During this intensive evaluation period, I worked closely with our sales team to understand their specific requirements, customized the platform to match their workflow, and discovered that HubSpot could not only meet our needs but offered far more flexibility than the industry-specific solution we were considering."
The team implemented a comprehensive and tailored solution using Marketing Hub, Sales Hub, and Operations Hub, with several key integrations.
A critical integration was connecting HubSpot to their loan origination system via API, enabling real-time synchronization of broker and loan information. "This integration was game-changing," says Becker. "We unlocked valuable data from our legacy loan platform and made it accessible through HubSpot's intuitive interface and reporting dashboards."
The team also used HubSpot's Outlook add-in to automatically capture and synchronize contact information. "It's an effortless way for account executives to build our database," explains Becker. “They simply write emails as normal, and contacts are automatically synced, updated, and associated with the correct companies."
Other key implementations included:
- Targeted marketing campaigns for specific broker segments
- Integration with GoToWebinar for automated lead capture and follow-up
- Custom dashboards for tracking broker engagement and loan pipelines
- Automated workflows for lead assignment and relationship management
"HubSpot became our foundation for building broker relationships," says Becker. "The Outlook add-in automatically captures all broker interactions, while our twice-weekly marketing emails keep them informed about our latest loan products and guidelines. We've built a disciplined approach to managing our broker relationships through HubSpot's tracking and alert capabilities."
The GoToWebinar integration has been particularly valuable for broker education and engagement. “Our weekly educational webinars help brokers understand our non-QM products and guidelines,” explains Becker. “With HubSpot's integration, we automatically capture attendee information and follow up with relevant resources. This has become a significant source of new leads, making it easier for brokers to learn about our products and start submitting loans sooner.”
Scaling personalized service nationwide
Since implementing HubSpot a little over four years ago, NQM Funding has scaled its broker engagement by 10X, growing its active network from 5,000 to 50,000 contacts. This data-driven approach has directly supported its expansion from a <$5M regional lender to a national leader with $4B in annual funding, all while ensuring brokers receive faster responses, better loan insights, and stronger borrower outcomes..
"Before HubSpot, each account executive worked independently with their broker base," explains Becker. "Now our entire team of about 20 account executives and 20 sales support professionals works as a unified force, with complete visibility into broker relationships and loan activities. While most of our wholesale business has traditionally come from brokers, this improved engagement has also helped us expand relationships with correspondent lenders, further accelerating our growth."
20% response rates through personalization
NQM Funding replaced generic, mass email blasts with data-driven, personalized broker communications, increasing response rates to 20%. This allows brokers to better serve borrowers and close more deals.
- More relevant outreach – Targeted updates help brokers identify more lending opportunities.
- Smarter follow-ups – Real-time tracking ensures timely, personalized engagement.
- Higher broker engagement – “We’re sending fewer but more relevant messages, and brokers actively engage because the content helps them identify more borrower opportunities,” says Becker.
“This ensures our broker partners stay informed about our latest lending guidelines and products, helping them identify more opportunities to serve borrowers who may not fit conventional mortgage criteria and might otherwise be turned away by traditional lenders.”
10X growth in customer engagement
By integrating marketing activities with sales follow-up, NQM Funding has seen a significant shift from cold calling to inbound inquiries. "Our account executives aren't just scouting for business anymore," says Becker. "They're responding to interested brokers who reach out based on our timely communications."
Faster loans with real-time insights
HubSpot's reporting capabilities have transformed how NQM Funding analyzes performance and makes decisions. "We have complete visibility across our sales funnel," says Becker. "From marketing engagement to loan pipelines, everything is trackable and actionable."
This visibility has transformed our broker relationships from transactional interactions to strategic partnerships where we can anticipate and meet broker needs and adapt our products to help brokers close more complex loans and grow their business.
100% adoption on one unified system
The platform has become essential to daily operations, with 100% adoption across the sales team. "HubSpot is the first thing our team opens in the morning," says Becker.
- Centralize workspace – With dashboards, brokers can see at-a-glance all the information they need to serve brokers effectively.
- Seamless collaboration – When brokers need help with urgent borrower scenarios, any team member can immediately access their history and needs.
- Rapid responses – Brokers have the data they need to give borrowers faster answers and close loans that might otherwise fall through.
Automated follow-ups mean no missed deals
"With a large broker network, we need to ensure every relationship stays active," explains Becker. "HubSpot helps us track engagement and automatically flags accounts that haven't been contacted within our set timeframes. This allows management to reassign accounts when needed, ensuring no opportunities are missed."
Looking ahead, NQM Funding continues to discover new ways to leverage HubSpot's evolving capabilities. "The creativity and development from the HubSpot team is impressive," says Becker.
"They're constantly releasing new features that help us deliver the quick, personal service our brokers expect, even as we grow nationally.”
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