The loyalty platform on Tuesday (Oct. 14) announced a partnership with United Wholesale Mortgage (UWM), the country’s largest mortgage lender.
With this collaboration, UWM becomes the first mortgage platform to let loan customers earn rewards on their mortgage payments, the companies said in a news release provided to PYMNTS.
“This partnership with Bilt is a game-changer for our broker partners, consumers and the industry as a whole,” Mat Ishbia, UWM’s president and CEO, said in the release.
“By integrating Bilt into our servicing platform, we are reimagining how a borrower views and thinks about their mortgage payments, while also creating an unmatched lead generation tool and exceptional client engagement for brokers.”
According to the release, the partnership allows customers to Earn Bilt Points with every on-time mortgage payment via Bilt’s reward program. They can also gain access to “exclusive neighborhood benefits” such as special offers from more than 40,000 local merchants around the country. In addition, Bilt’s more than 5 million members can earn points on their monthly payments when working with UWM brokers.
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PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster spoke with Ishbia and Bilt founder and CEO Ankur Jain Tuesday following the announcement.
“Our belief is that similar to the neighborhood ecosystem we’ve been building with merchants, when you’re ready to buy a home, we want to use our tech to make it easy, but have a human in the neighborhood who can help you go through that process and answer all these questions,” said Jain.
“And so we’ve teamed up with UWM because they have the largest network of local brokers across the country. Now when you’re ready to buy a home Bilt members can be paired with a UWM broker and seamlessly go through an application process through our joint tech platform,” he added.
Webster asked about the regulatory implications of offering people rewards for on-time mortgage payments. Ishbia insisted all the boxes were checked on that front.
“The point about it is giving an amazing experience for the consumer so the consumers can feel that, hey, when they make their mortgage payment, this is not like making a mortgage payment at some big bank or some big retail,” he said. “Like this is a consumer facing awesome app.”
The partnership comes a little more than three months after Bilt announced it was expanding its loyalty program to include all housing categories.
Introduced in June 2021 to let members earn rewards on rent payments for apartments, the Bilt program now also includes condo homeowners association (HOA) fees, student housing payments and mortgage payments, Jain said in a letter to Bilt members in July.
“What makes Bilt special isn’t just our scale — it’s our flywheel effect,” Jain wrote. “More properties in our network attract more merchants, which creates more value for residents, which attracts more properties. This virtuous cycle, powered by our AI-driven commerce platform and comprehensive merchant integrations, creates an ecosystem that becomes stronger with each new participant.”
