Ever since I saw CEO Ray Davis speak at BAI in the mid-1990s, I’ve been a huge Umpqua Bank fan. But most of the bank’s notoriety is around its fresh take on the brick-and-mortar experience. But that’s not my thing, at all, so I don’t get a chance to write about them often.

However, today I was delighted to see a new mobile app appear in the iOS store called Umpqua Home Hunter. It’s a simple tool for house hunting. When a home buyer runs across a home of interest when out and about, they can open up the Home Hunter and automatically document the address (via GPS), then add comments, pictures, and a 1-to-5 star rating (see screenshots below).

There is also clever integration to Umpqua lenders. Users can forward the house to the lender of their choice to start the mortgage prequalification process (see third screenshot). 

Bottom line: While the app is pretty basic, lacking integration to home value databases such as Zillow, or MLS/Realtor services such as Redfin, it could recoup its development costs with a couple incremental mortgages every month. And even if it fails to do that, it’s a novel mobile service that helps position Umpqua as an innovator in digital, like they’ve long been in branch banking. 

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Users add a home details                    ….pictures, comments, rating

Below left: Users have the option to send homes over to their Umpqua
loan officer to get the mortgage process started