Vesta raises $30 million to grow AI mortgage automation, with lenders among its investors

Mortgage lenders using Vesta are handing AI agents work that can extend to underwriting decisions, CEO Mike Yu says. The startup announced a $30 million Series B on October 8, led by Conversion Capital, to grow its mortgage-processing platform. The financing backs a system where lenders choose how much work agents perform without human approval.

The round brings Vesta’s total funding to $85 million. Pennymac and New American Funding, both customers, invested alongside Citi Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz. Their participation puts lenders on both sides of the transaction: buying the software and backing the company that supplies it.

Yu told TechCrunch that revenue rose 12-fold year over year, though he put Vesta’s market share below 5%. Vesta also says lenders using its platform or migrating to it originate more than $100 billion in mortgages annually. That figure includes customers still moving onto the system, not just those already operating on it.

From checking documents to deciding loans

Vesta’s software manages mortgage origination—the work from a loan application through funding. The company says staff and agents work on the same loan files inside one platform. Lenders can assign agents document review, data validation and cross-checks, with issues needing human attention passed to a person.

AI use is optional. Vesta says about 40% of tasks completed through its platform are handled by AI agents and automated workflows. That combined measure does not isolate the share performed by AI agents alone. Yu describes adoption as a gradual handoff:

Many of our customers start an AI agent with a person approving its work, then let it handle a share of loans on its own, then expand

Mike Yu, Vesta co-founder and CEO, speaking to TechCrunch

Some lenders already use the agents to make underwriting decisions, Yu said. Lenders remain responsible for those decisions regardless of the software they use. He says Vesta records actions and the reasoning behind decisions for compliance and audits.

Yu credits Claude Sonnet 4.5 with a breakthrough for Vesta’s agents. He said it followed customer-configured instructions better than earlier model generations over the extended sequences of work mortgage processing requires. That is Vesta’s assessment of the model for its own tasks, not an independent performance comparison.

Savings before agents switched on

Pennymac reported a 25% reduction in its operational cost to originate loans and roughly 50% efficiency gains for loan officers after replacing its previous system with Vesta. Crucially, those gains came before activating AI agents, according to the announcement covered by HousingWire. They support the platform’s efficiency pitch, but do not measure the agents’ added benefit.

The new capital will support hiring, market growth and new product lines. Yu said those plans include a personal assistant for mortgage issuers that can perform tasks and track workflows. Vesta is hiring across engineering, implementation and go-to-market roles as it works to onboard more lenders.