Business Women Awards 2022
Achievement Honoree Jessica Kennedy, Beeline Loans Inc.
JESSICA KENNEDY HAS GONE from Florida to Boston to Rhode Island and from the workday rat race to helping others out of the often blood-boiling mortgage application process.
Her own career track is an example, and so is her Providence company, Beeline Loans Inc. – designed to provide consumers a way to obtain a home loan in a far less tedious and time-consuming process than the current antiquated setup.
Kennedy, Beeline’s chief operating officer, and other co-founders launched the company in 2020, which shakes up the traditional home-loan system to make it easier and less stressful for people buying homes by allowing them to do it all from their mobile phones in real time and in as little as 15 minutes.
The technology makes the loan underwriting and document review process seamless for both the borrower and the underwriter, but the road to this new kind of mortgage company – which started out with 12 people and now has a team of 85 – first began with Kennedy finding a career track that best suited her and her place in life.
As an attorney, Kennedy grew tired of the frenetic pace of corporate life and knew it couldn’t continue as her family grew. From 2015 to 2019 she worked for Solidifi Title & Closing LLC of Middletown, where the pace was less frantic, she said. Ultimately, Kennedy left Solidifi and started Beeline along with co-founders Nick Liuzza, Peter Gonzalez, Greg Ellis, Jay Stockwell and Cameron Slabosz.
While starting a business in a pandemic isn’t ideal, the launch also came during an upswing in the housing market and a boom in mortgage refinancing due to low interest rates. Beeline saw immediate growth, climbing to a revenue run rate of $13 million in the first year. It’s now operating in 12 states.
Creating a healthier work-life balance for herself is echoed in the healthier, stress-reduced mortgage application process Beeline says it offers.
“Nick had always had this idea. He had worked with so many lenders and thought, ‘There has to be a better way.’ There was just no one applying technology in a meaningful way in this space,” Kennedy said. “There was no commonsense way of doing business here. Buyers were at a disadvantage. It was like the little guy losing out. But it doesn’t need to be like that. There is a more transparent way to work with a customer and let them be part of the purchase.”
