Jess Kennedy
General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer, Beeline
Age: 36
Industry experience: 11 years
Jess Kennedy saw the mortgage process as a painful experience for people and wanted to find a way to remove that pain. Two years ago, she joined a team of five people who set out to build a digital lending platform. Despite the pandemic, the group went ahead and launched Beeline on May 19 in seven states, including Massachusetts, with a goal of expanding nationally. A lawyer with a background in real estate finance, Kennedy previously worked as the general counsel for a national title insurance company. She is now Providence, Rhode Island-based Beeline’s general counsel and chief compliance officer.
Q: What is Beeline?
A: Beeline is exactly what the name sounds like: We consider it the shortest path to someone’s new home or refinance. We’ve done that by compressing this old-school, meandering approval process that usually takes many days, lots of back and forth between the consumer and the lender – and probably several headaches for the consumer along the way – into a 15–minute journey for that consumer. We’ve done that through the use of proprietary software and artificial intelligence to come up with a one–minute approval.
Q: How did the idea for Beeline come about?
A: There’s a group of five of us that are founders, and we all come from varying areas in real estate, mortgage services, fintech, and consumer lending. We just saw a really painful process for the consumer. Even in our own experiences or in our friends’ experiences, we were realizing that the homebuying process was no longer being celebrated; it was just being endured. People kind of felt bullied, and they felt like the balance of power was really inequitable and that they were at a disadvantaged position in the financial transaction.
We really wanted to bring the humanity back to the transaction – not have it actually be transaction-based – and really get people back to celebrating those life milestones, those life events. The way we found to do that was by layering in technology with this artificial intelligence and supporting that with human contact at Beeline in the form of what we call a loan guide, which is a consumer’s single point of contact for their entire loan cycle. That way people can feel like they’ve got someone who’s really approachable for as many or as few questions as they want.
Q: What role does the artificial intelligence play in the process?
A: On our platform, consumers will go through a five–step journey that takes them approximately 15 minutes. During that journey, there are various points where AI is coming into play, and people can directly link to their bank, their pay, and their tax information. The AI is grabbing that data, intelligently looking at it along with other answers that a consumer has provided in those five steps, decisioning that data as it comes in and instantly verifying the information so that we can give a really reliable purchase-ready or refi-ready approval at the end of that 15 minutes.
Q: What opportunities do you see in the Massachusetts market?
A: I lived in Massachusetts for 5 years. It’s got a great digital–forward population. When I lived in Boston, I was seeing a ton of tech and pharma companies coming in and loads of new people coming to the city. It’s a great environment for people looking to buy a home and people already with homes to refinance. The economy is nice and strong. The job market’s been very strong. Even through economic downturns, Massachusetts has fared far better than other states. It’s got a nice digital–forward, highly educated population, and I think that’s a really great breeding ground for the digital consumer that we really want to deliver our services to.
Q: How has the economic crisis affected Beeline?
A: It’s been a really interesting time to come into the market, absolutely. There are things that are coming out of the pandemic that I think can still benefit consumers. Interest rates are at all–time lows, which is great for people. I think that Beeline is really well–positioned in a market like this because our targeted market was always the digital consumer: people who wanted less paperwork, fewer headaches associated with the transaction, didn’t really care to go into a bank branch or have people in their homes, maybe have very busy lives or like doing a lot of things in their financial world in a technology–forward way or on a mobile app.
Obviously in this environment, a lot of people are moving to doing more things online than they probably ever have before. We never could have anticipated coming out in an environment like this, but we are the lender for people who want that type of digital experience. Especially right now with people trying to responsibly socially distance, Beeline is a great way for people to still meet those life goals and financial milestones while being responsible and feeling like they’re keeping themselves and their family safe. Weird times, but I think there are some things we can offer people in the marketplace to keep their financial hopes and dreams alive.
Q: How do you plan to reach potential customers?
A: We’ve got online marketing that we are involved with – anything from social media platforms to having our rates posted on various rate boards. In certain markets, we also have local partners, and these are people who are boots on the ground, who have great relationships with consumers and Realtors in the marketplace, so that Realtors and consumers can feel very comfortable with a local presence, even with us growing into a national brand as we expand our state footprint over the next year or so. It’s a joint effort of a national outreach through online markets and also that local presence that I think will really set us apart, particularly as it relates to purchase transactions.
Kennedy’s Five Favorite Boston Area Restaurants
- Canary Square
- Toro
- Bricco
- Caffé Vittoria
- Orinoco
