Build
Governance & Program Build
Standing up the function that was missing, with the written policy, the working checklists, the trained staff, and a file that shows the process.
What gets built
- Appraisal desk stand-up. The function, the org placement, the authority, the workflow, and the person who owns it in writing.
- Review and quality control program. What the desk catches, how it samples, how reviewers are calibrated, and where a finding goes.
- Reconsideration of value program. Policy, borrower disclosure, subject-matter-expert gate, appraiser communication standard, turn-time expectations, outcome documentation, and channel coverage down to correspondent and broker.
- AMC and vendor oversight program. Contract standards, service levels, performance reporting, escalation, panel-level monitoring, and the file that proves oversight happened.
- Panel management program. Eligibility, onboarding, credential currency, geographic and product competency, performance monitoring, and removal with a defensible record.
- Valuation technology governance. Permitted contribution, qualification records, verification requirements, and disclosure. Built on the published standard.
What this has looked like
The most recent one
A non-QM lender, four months old and growing fast. Account managers across the organisation were ordering their own appraisals and managing them independently. There was no central function, no separation between sales and valuation, no policy framework, and no governance structure, which meant an appraiser-independence exposure on every loan that closed.
I centralised the function and established separation of duty. I wrote the governance library from nothing: the statement of engagement, rebuilt from eight bullet points into a full instrument covering scope, appraiser qualifications, errors and omissions, independence, report content standards, property eligibility and flood and title requirements; the AMC approval and oversight policy; the valuation desk operational policy; the AMC onboarding workflow; the reconsideration-of-value handling procedure; vendor exclusion procedures; a quarterly AMC scorecard; and a data-security questionnaire. None of it existed before.
I architected the ordering platform: field mapping, integration, AMC activation, workflow design across the platform and the loan origination system. I designed a reporting framework of seventy-plus metrics across eight operational categories, from pipeline and turn-time through collateral review, vendor analytics and capacity.
And I did it while running the desk: more than seventeen hundred orders a year, sole operator, no predecessor and no backup. Building the thing and operating it at the same time is not the ideal way to do this. It is, however, the honest description of what most of my clients are actually facing.
The part I point to first is not the volume. When a third-party review firm ran secondary-market due diligence on that portfolio for a prospective institutional buyer, the enforced separation between quality control and appraiser independence was identified as a strength of the collateral pool. I had to argue for that structure internally before it was adopted, and an institutional buyer validated it from the outside afterwards.
That library is theirs, and no part of it is on this website. Ask me on a call and I will take you through sanitized examples of what the work looks like. What transfers to you is the method, and the knowledge of which parts break first when you build one under load.
The method
Six phases, from scope to handover.
- Scope
A conversation, then a written scope of work naming the documents I need, the system access level, what is in scope and what is expressly out. Nothing starts before this is signed.
You get: Statement of work with a fixed fee and a fixed end date
- Current state
I read what exists: policies, workflows, files, and the gap between what the documents say and what actually happens.
You get: A current-state record the design phase builds against
- Design
The program on paper: org placement, authority, workflow, controls, and who owns each of them.
You get: A design you approve before anything is built
- Build
The instruments themselves: policy, procedures, checklists, templates, taxonomy, reporting.
You get: The working program, documented
- Implement
The program goes live with the people who run it. Training delivered live, in session.
You get: Trained staff and a running function
- Handover
A documented handover recording who holds each control, so the program survives without me.
You get: The written handover
What you receive
- Written policy and procedure
- Role definitions and delegated authority
- Working checklists and templates
- A defect taxonomy and severity model
- A reporting pack
- Staff training, delivered live
- A documented handover so the program survives without me
Fee and terms
- Fee basis
- Fixed fee, quoted in the scope
- Timeline
- Eight to sixteen weeks
- Deposit
- 50% on signing; milestone billing thereafter
- System access
- Level 2 (named, time-boxed, read-only)
Handover
A program that only works while I am in it is not a program. Every build ends with the documentation, the training, and the named internal owner required for it to run without me, and a written handover recording who holds each control. If you never call again, the thing still works.
Questions
Do you build it or do we?
I write the instruments and design the program; your people run it, and the implement phase exists to make that real. A build that leaves with the consultant was never a build.
Can this start from your readiness findings?
That is the usual path. The findings register becomes the scope, which is why the assessment prices the build accurately.
What if we already have policies?
Then the current-state phase reads them against what actually happens, and the build closes the gap rather than starting over. You pay for the delta, not for a rewrite of what works.
Who trains our staff?
I do, live, in session. Training is not a video library.
Most builds start from a readiness assessment's findings. Either way, it starts with a conversation.
Schedule a Conversation