Covius

Covius is a residential and commercial real estate advisory and technology services company, serving financial institutions, federal lending banks, government-sponsored enterprises, real estate portfolio managers, mortgage lenders and other real estate specific organizations.^[1] Covius’ is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia and also maintains offices in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Services

Covius real estate advisory services for residential properties or mortgages include analysis of loan origination quality control, property inspections, broker price opinions, property preservation, adherence to underwriting guidelines, compliance, forensic loan reviews, surveillance oversight, and decision support.^[2][3] Covius real estate advisory services for commercial properties or mortgages include loan underwriting, lease abstraction, data capture/validation, property inspections, broker price opinions, property market analysis, insurance reviews and transfers and assumptions.^[2][3] Covius technology services provides document management solutions that consist of imaging and indexing, onsite document scanning, document tracking and retrieval, OCR, Web-based document management, eDiscovery and compliance. The company also offers application development and tailored technology solutions.^[2][3]

History

On February 7, 2014 Covius announced that it had acquired the Global Real Estate Services (GRES) group from RR Donnelley & Sons.^[1] While the history of Covius itself started in 2014, the platform it acquired dates back to the mid 1980s:

• 1985 - While serving as the chief whole loan trader for E.F. Hutton Mortgage Corporation, Ric Tomlinson leads a group of EF Hutton employees to execute a management buyout of Hutton's mortgage business to form Univest Financial Group, Inc.^[4] That same year, Univest creates a proprietary, cutting-edge pricing models providing clients with a sound quantitative methodology to profile risk and value non-standard mortgage portfolios, particularly those with diverse adjustable rate features. The system was known as the Mortgage Portfolio Analysis System (MORPAS), and with this technology, Univest was able to audit, analyze and evaluate residential and commercial portfolios and structure secondary market transactions.^[4]
• 1987 - FSLIC awards Univest its first regulatory-related due diligence project. Univest becomes a leading contractor for the FSLIC, performing on over 30,000 loans over a two-and-a-half year period.^[5]
• 1989 - Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC) is formed. Univest recommends that the agency apply full due diligence for all portfolios brought to market and create a national standard for all contractors to follow. Univest's index of residential data elements and due diligence codes was adopted as the core of the work requirement for the RTC's Atlanta Pilot Program.^[6]
• 1991 – FASRE Field Services, Inc. (FASRE), a privately held company which provided national inspection services to the mortgage industry as well as other non-banking industries is formed.^[7][8] Also this year, RTC awards Univest the contract to manage the RTC's Central Loan Database, which served as the backbone of the RTC's National Loan Marketing Effort.^[6]
• 1995 – Univest Financial Group Inc. (UFGI) separates its business into three distinct companies: Univest Financial Services, an underwriting and due diligence firm, Univest Financial Group, an information management services firm serving the regulatory markets, and Univest Holdings, LLC, an investment holding company.^[9] Then, later that year Univest sells Univest Financial Services to a private investor group, which eventually sold the company to General Motors Acceptance Corporation (GMAC).^{[9] [10]}
• 2000 - General Motors' mortgage division, GMAC Commercial Mortgage (GMACCM) creates an on-line subsidiary, MortgageRamp.^[11] One of MortgageRamp’ premier products was Deal Central, a proprietary, Web-based technology platform delivering increased efficiency, productivity and cost savings by integrating the entire process of originating, packaging, underwriting, pipeline management and reporting, closing and delivering commercial mortgage loans.^[12]
• 2001 –McCracken Financial Software Inc., a subsidiary of GMAC acquires Univest Financial Services and FASRE Field Services Inc. Univest Financial Services was an underwriting and due diligence group spin off of Univest Financial Group Inc., while FASRE Field Services Inc. was the nation's largest provider of annual property inspections to the commercial mortgage servicing industry.^{[8][13][14][15][16]}
• 2005 - Office Tiger, which was a pioneer in outsourcing back office services to India, with a primary focus on law, banking and publishing acquires MortgageRamp from General Motors Acceptance Corp.^[2][17] As part of this acquisition OfficeTiger assumed all of MortgageRamp’s due-diligence, underwriting and document-management services.^[18]
• 2006 - RR Donnelley and Sons (RRD), a Fortune 500 company that provides print and related services acquires Office Tiger.^[19]

References

External links

• Covius.com