Digital mortgage firm Blend cuts 30% of staff

Digital mortgage firm Blend Labs enacted another series of cuts, the company’s fourth round of layoffs in the last year.

The mortgage tech and title insurance provider is laying off 28 percent of its remaining workforce, according to a regulatory filing reported by Inman. The cuts will affect approximately 340 employees at the firm, focused on Blend Title and corporate operations in research and development, sales and marketing and general and administrative operations.

Co-founder and CEO Nima Ghamsari said in a statement the cuts would “align the organization for market realities and prepare for future growth.”

This round of layoffs also came with the exit of several executives, including president Timothy Mayopoulos, who will remain on the company’s board of directors.

Layoffs have become the norm at Blend. In April, the company cut 200 jobs before eliminating 220 jobs in August. Two months ago, another 100 employees were affected by layoffs.

Blend reported a $132.7 million net loss in November for the third quarter. Revenue dropped 38 percent year-over-year, tallying $55.3 million in the third quarter. Since being founded in 2012, Blend has posted a loss in every quarter, accumulating a deficit of more than $1 billion.

Losses are largely being driven by national title insurance and settlement services business Title365, which the company acquired in 2021. Revenue dropped 65 percent year-over-year and Blend took a $57.9 million charge in the third quarter, a write off of its investment in Title365.

The company said the layoffs and other cost-cutting measures will produce annualized savings of more than $100 million by the end of the year.

The company went public in July 2021, sporting a $4 billion valuation. But the company has been roiled by the downturn in the mortgage market, which came as the Federal Reserve raised interest rates, sending mortgage rates upward and thinning demand for a significant portion of last year.

Blend is planning on spending the year focused on shifting from being product-based to platform-based. A bigger share of the company’s operating expenses will go towards Blend Builder, a subscription-based platform that collects “success based” transaction fees from clients.

— Holden Walter-Warner