USDA is automating its loan application uploading

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced this week that it has awarded technology services firm Phoenixteam a $49 million contract to modernize its mortgage underwriting platform, the Guaranteed Underwriting System (GUS).

The Arlington, V.A.-based company will overhaul GUS, which supports USDA’s guaranteed loan program for rural and farming communities. Phoenixteam said the updates will expand lender participation and improve access to affordable housing in underserved areas.

“This award is about more than technology — it’s about access to homeownership,” said Phoenixteam CEO Tanya Brennan. “By modernizing USDA’s Guaranteed Underwriting System, we make it easier for lenders to deliver this product, which is often the only path to homeownership for rural families.”

Among the planned upgrades is automated loan application uploading, a function long available at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac but absent from GUS. Lenders have frequently criticized the platform as confusing and cumbersome, with manual re-entry requirements that discouraged some originators from offering USDA loans. 

Previous modernization efforts, dating back to the platform’s 2006 launch, stalled due to funding constraints.

Shaun Michael Lewis, CEO of residential, recreational and luxury real estate brokerage Clearwater Properties, says that his operational scope is “heavily rural,” leading many of the buyers he works with to rely on USDA loans.

“Automated uploading will be transformational for our operations, as the current manual documentation process generates significant delays, often 2-3 weeks just for initial feedback from underwriting,” he said. “If the automation is executed well and reduces this wait to days, our agents will be able to move faster on time-sensitive rural property transactions where the buyer otherwise has limited financing options.”

As a result, Lewis says the updated standards will level the playing field. “Based on what we have read with regard to the modernization effort, we would anticipate a 40-50% reduction in processing time, with a decrease in associated costs. In rural markets, especially competitive ones, every day matters,” he said. 

Jessica Vance, an LO for Anchor Funding, agrees. “For too long, the tech gap made USDA loans feel too slow,” she said. “Once GUS is modernized, I expect underwriting times to shrink by days, with real cost savings on the back end.”

Bringing GUS up to GSE standards is expected to simplify rural lending, broaden financing options and advance USDA’s mission of expanding homeownership opportunities.

Founded in 2015, Phoenixteam’s leadership includes veterans of IBM, the Department of Veterans Affairs and Black Knight Financial Services.

Although USDA loans represent a small portion of the mortgage market — just 0.6% of 2024 originations, or 36,173 loans totaling $6.4 billion, according to HMDA data — they remain an important tool for economic development in rural America.