Most credit unions still make members wait for home equity loans. Here’s how AI-powered lending can speed up HELOCs, protect risk, and deepen member loyalty.
Most credit unions are sitting on a goldmine of member trust and data, but their lending process still feels like it’s stuck in 2008. Members can get an instant home equity offer from a fintech app, yet wait days for a HELOC decision from the institution they’ve banked with for 15 years.
That gap isn’t just annoying. It’s where credit unions lose loans, relationships, and relevance.
On a recent CUInsight Network episode, Coviance Chief Revenue Officer Allen Jingst summed up the challenge with a simple call:
“Let’s challenge each other to lead.”
This post builds on that idea and zooms in on a specific battleground: AI-powered home equity and HELOC lending. If you’re in a credit union leadership or lending role, this is where you can meaningfully grow member relationships, real estate loan volume, and non-interest income—without burning out your staff.
We’ll break down how AI and automation can transform lending, where humans still matter most, and what it looks like to actually lead rather than react.
Why Home Equity & HELOC Lending Is Your Member Loyalty Engine
Home equity and HELOC lending is one of the most powerful, under-optimized levers credit unions have for growth and member loyalty.
Here’s why it matters:
- Members are sitting on record home equity. In the US, tappable home equity hit trillions of dollars in recent years. Many members don’t even realize how much borrowing power they have.
- Real estate loans anchor primary relationships. When a member has a mortgage or HELOC with you, they’re far more likely to keep deposits, use your cards, and bring over more accounts.
- Fintechs and big banks are already courting your members. They’re not winning because they care more; they’re winning because the process feels easier.
Coviance’s focus on making home equity and HELOC lending “simpler, faster, and friction-free” lines up with what I’ve seen across high-performing credit unions:
- They treat home equity lending as a strategic member experience product, not just another loan type.
- They obsess about turnaround time and clear communication.
- They invest in AI-driven lending platforms that remove manual headaches across underwriting, documentation, and decisioning.
The reality? If your home equity process still requires multiple branch visits, paper-heavy workflows, and manual status checks, you’ve already lost the race—especially with younger members.
Automating Lending Without Losing the Human Touch
AI and automation in lending isn’t about replacing people. It’s about removing everything that gets in the way of people doing their best work.
Allen Jingst talks about automating the lending process while enhancing the human touch. That’s the right framing. The credit unions that get this right use automation in three core ways.
1. Automate the grind, not the relationship
The first step is to pull your best lending staff out of admin mode:
- No more re-keying application data between systems
- No more chasing missing documents via email
- No more manual checklists and sticky notes for every file
An AI-powered lending platform can:
- Pre-fill applications with member data you already have
- Automatically request, receive, and organize required documents
- Run rule-based checks for eligibility, collateral, and risk
The member doesn’t care that a robot did the boring parts. They care that:
- Their application took 8 minutes instead of 35
- They got a decision in hours, not days
- A real person was available when things got complex
2. Use AI to make decisions faster and fairer
Credit unions worry, understandably, about losing control when AI enters lending. Here’s the thing: AI isn’t deciding who’s “good” or “bad.” It’s applying your policies consistently, then surfacing edge cases where a human underwriter should weigh in.
Strong platforms can:
- Apply decision rules the same way every time
- Flag exceptions for manual review instead of auto-declining
- Use alternative data (within your policy) to more fully understand member risk
Done well, this can actually increase approvals for members who would otherwise fall slightly outside rigid traditional models—while still protecting the portfolio.
3. Free your staff to be advisors, not form processors
Once automation handles 60–80% of routine tasks, your team can:
- Spend more time advising members on which product actually fits their needs
- Proactively contact members who could benefit from a HELOC for renovations or debt consolidation
- Focus on complex cases where judgment, empathy, and context matter
This is the human side Allen is talking about. AI should create space for empathy, not erase it.
Turning Credit Union Insight into AI-Ready Workflows
Allen makes a point that doesn’t get enough attention: credit unions are long-standing institutions with deep insight to leverage.
You know your members. You know your markets. You’ve seen cycles. The issue usually isn’t data—it’s how that insight is (or isn’t) embedded in your workflows.
From tribal knowledge to codified intelligence
Most credit unions have “that one” senior lender or underwriter who just knows:
- Which neighborhoods are lower risk than they look on paper
- Which member patterns actually signal strong repayment
- Which combinations of LTV, DTI, and tenure are acceptable
AI is most valuable when that knowledge isn’t locked in one person’s head.
A strong lending technology partner will:
- Analyze your current workflows and policies
- Where are decisions slowed by unclear rules?
- Where are exceptions common and why?
- Innovate with you
- Turn your unwritten rules into clear decision criteria
- Design workflows that align with your risk appetite and service goals
- Initiate and iterate
- Launch updated workflows in the platform
- Track time-to-decision, approval rates, and portfolio performance
- Refine the rules based on outcomes
That “analyze, innovate, initiate” rhythm is how you move from legacy processes to an AI-ready lending model—without losing your credit union’s identity.
Example: Modernizing a HELOC workflow
Here’s what I’ve seen work when a credit union modernizes home equity lending using an AI-based platform:
-
Before:
- 12–15 days average time from application to approval
- Manual income and property verification
- Confusing communication; members call branches for updates
-
After implementing an automated, AI-supported workflow:
- 24–48 hour decisions for standard applications
- Automated income verification and instant AVM (automated valuation model) on most properties
- Self-service status tracking plus proactive notifications to members
Nothing about that example is magic. It’s workflow discipline plus technology that’s actually built for home equity and HELOC lending.
Designing Member-Centric AI Lending Experiences
AI for credit unions only matters if members feel the difference.
A member-centric lending experience is simple: fast, transparent, and respectful of the member’s time. When you apply AI to home equity or HELOC lending with that lens, a few design principles stand out.
Make it brutally easy to start
Members should be able to:
- Begin an application from mobile, desktop, or in-branch with the same experience
- Save and resume easily
- See clearly what information they’ll need before they begin
This is where pre-filled data and smart forms powered by your lending platform shine. If you already know the member’s address, income sources, and relationship history, they shouldn’t have to type it again.
Communicate like a human, powered by AI
AI can help you:
- Trigger timely updates when the file moves from one stage to another
- Personalize messages based on where the member is in the process
- Offer digital self-service FAQs and explanations of next steps
But the tone and content of those messages should feel like your credit union, not a generic app. You want members thinking, "They really have their act together," not "Did I just get passed to a third-party fintech?"
Respect risk while reducing friction
You don’t need to choose between strict risk management and a good experience. AI helps you:
- Apply consistent rules and risk checks behind the scenes
- Only ask for extra documentation when it’s truly required
- Tailor verification steps to the risk profile of the loan, not a one-size-fits-all checklist
Members experience fewer hurdles, and your lending team gets a cleaner, more complete file when human review is needed.
From Followers to Leaders: How Credit Unions Can Push the Movement Forward
"Let’s challenge each other to lead" isn’t just a nice line from a podcast—it’s a necessary mindset shift.
Most credit unions look side-to-side: "What are peers our size doing?" The ones that win in AI-powered lending look ahead: "What will our members expect three years from now, and how do we build that now?"
Here’s what leadership in AI lending actually looks like in practice.
1. Treat AI lending as a strategic initiative, not an IT project
Ownership can’t live only with IT or only with lending. The strongest efforts are:
- Sponsored by the C-suite (CEO, CFO, CLO)
- Run by a cross-functional squad: lending, operations, IT, risk, and member experience
- Measured against clear outcomes: decision time, pull-through, member satisfaction, portfolio health
2. Start with one high-impact use case: home equity & HELOC
Trying to modernize every product at once usually ends in stalled pilots. Instead:
- Pick home equity / HELOC as the beachhead
- Tighten your workflows end-to-end on one AI-ready platform
- Build your internal muscle on change management, staff training, and member communication
Once that’s stable, you can extend the same architecture to other loan types.
3. Share what works with peers
Allen’s challenge to "encourage each other to innovate" matters. Credit unions have always been at their best when they collaborate instead of compete blindly.
You can lead by:
- Sharing lending transformation results at chapter meetings or conferences
- Comparing workflows and performance metrics with peer institutions
- Being honest about what didn’t work the first time
The cooperative model is your advantage. Use it.
Where to Go Next: Turning Interest into Action
AI-powered home equity and HELOC lending isn’t a science fiction concept—it’s an operational choice.
Credit unions that:
- Automate the right parts of the lending process
- Protect and elevate the human relationship
- Turn internal insight into clear, AI-ready workflows
…are already seeing faster decisions, happier members, and more efficient lending operations.
If your lending teams are swamped, your members are waiting too long, or your HELOC portfolio feels stagnant, this is your signal to move. Start conversations internally, push for a real strategy, and partner with specialists who live and breathe AI for credit union lending.
The next wave of member-centric banking won’t be defined by who has the flashiest app. It’ll be defined by institutions that use AI to be more human, more responsive, and more aligned with member needs—especially when they’re tapping the equity in their homes.
The question now isn’t whether AI belongs in your lending strategy. It’s how quickly you’re ready to lead.