Reduce Pre‑Closing Delays with Refreshable Asset‑Based Employment Checks

The days just before closing carry a lot of operational and relationship risk. Terms are locked, documents are largely in place, and expectations are set. Then the pre-close verification of employment check stalls, an employer is hard to reach, or a form comes back incomplete, and a near‑clear file turns into a scramble.

Pre‑closing employment verification is essential for risk management, but the way it is handled today often creates last‑minute work, borrower frustration, and timeline risk. 

At the same time, lenders already hold one of the cleanest, most current signals of a borrower’s ongoing employment: recent income deposit activity. 

This article explores how refreshable, asset‑based employment checks can reduce pre‑closing delays, strengthen confidence in the decision, and streamline the experience for both borrowers and internal teams.

Where pre‑funding checks create unnecessary pressure

Many organizations already have strong coverage on income and employment at the initial underwrite. The real strain shows up later, when guidelines require updated verification of employment (VOE) shortly before funding.

You see the familiar patterns:

• Files that are otherwise clear‑to‑close pause while someone reaches out to an employer.
• Teams resort to phone calls, faxes, and email chains to chase a simple confirmation.
• Borrowers get pulled back into the process with new asks they did not expect this late in the journey.

However, the difference now is that asset data is widely available in structured form and can be refreshed without restarting the borrower experience. That creates an opportunity to let a data signal handle more of the pre‑closing work that used to depend on last‑minute outreach.

Connecting refreshable asset checks to Desktop Underwriter® (DU®), Loan Product Advisor® (LPA®), and agency expectations

Asset‑based employment checks do not stand on their own. They need to align to standards set within Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac’s automated underwriting systems (AUS) in order to deliver and document data appropriately to:

• Be successfully submitted to Desktop Underwriter® (DU®) and Loan Product Advisor® (LPA®).
• Help support how assets and related verifications are documented for agency review.
• Contribute to eligibility for relief of representations and warranties through Fannie Mae’s DU® validation service, which provides lenders with Day 1 Certainty^®, and LPA® asset and income modeler (AIM) when the broader criteria for those programs are met.

The aim is to meet policy‑driven pre-closing employment verification requirements with electronic evidence that fits naturally into existing DU® and LPA® workflows. That makes the file easier to sell, easier to review, and less dependent on a successful last‑minute phone call.

Priorities for an updated Verification of Assets (VOA) strategy

For leaders reassessing how verification of assets (VOA) fits into pre‑closing verification, a few questions can clarify where the biggest gains may be:

• Can we refresh asset data without resetting the borrower experience?
  Pre‑closing checks should build on existing permissions, not feel like a new process.
• Are our outputs structured for automated underwriting systems (AUS) and review?
  Asset‑based checks should produce standardized reports that DU®, LPA®, and internal reviewers can assess without manual translation.
• Do risk and quality control (QC) teams have access to this data?
  Asset‑level information that only lives in PDFs is harder to use for oversight and continuous improvement.

A modern VOA approach addresses these questions directly, not as afterthoughts.

Implementing refreshable asset‑based checks with Blend

Since pre‑closing employment verification is a time-sensitive point in the mortgage process, Blend has expanded its VOA capabilities so lenders can use Supplemental Asset Reports to help satisfy the 10‑Day Pre‑Closing VOE guideline with electronic data instead of manual VOE documentation, reducing late‑stage delays.

Using Blend’s VOA capabilities, lenders are able to:

• Have borrowers’ permission their accounts once and then refresh asset data later in the process, reducing the need to ask again for bank statements or chase additional documents.
• Leverage Supplemental Asset Reports that provide an employment‑focused signal from recent deposit activity to help meet 10‑day pre‑closing employment verification expectations with electronic data instead of phone calls and paper VOE forms.

Initial VOA setup becomes the foundation for employment‑only checks that use refreshed deposit activity to reconfirm ongoing employment without changing the income and assets already used for underwriting, lowering reliance on last‑minute outreach and reducing the risk of surprise delays at clear‑to‑close.

Use asset‑based checks to cut pre‑closing delays

Refreshable, asset‑based checks offer a path to:

• Reduce reliance on last‑minute employer outreach for many employed borrowers.
• Cut down on surprise delays in the final days before funding.

If your teams are still heavily dependent on manual employment verification, repeated statement requests, and one‑off pre‑closing employment verification efforts, it may be time to revisit how assets fit into your broader verification strategy.

See how Blend’s asset verification capabilities can help you modernize this part of the process.

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