Hound Group built a SaaS platform that helped Australian mortgage brokers monitor their loan books and manage client portfolios for retention, using consented open-banking data to flag pay-downs, refinances and review opportunities. That standalone platform no longer operates separately: Hound’s own site now says Hound and Sherlok have joined forces and directs brokers to Sherlok.
This guide covers what the Hound platform did, where its capability lives now and how to judge retention technology like it before you commit. Provider details change quickly in this space, so verify anything decision-critical on the current official sites before acting on this overview.
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What The Hound Platform Did
Hound’s historical pitch addressed a familiar problem: the back book goes quiet while pay-downs and competitor refinances quietly erode it. The platform monitored loans through consented bank-data feeds, surfaced clients’ current loan products and interest rates without requiring calls to lenders, and generated annual-review reports plus client-service prompts so brokers could reach out at the right moments.
For busy brokerages the value proposition was simple: systematic monitoring instead of memory. A broker with eight hundred settled loans cannot personally check each one every quarter, and software that watches the whole book fills exactly that gap.
The Move To Sherlok
Sherlok now carries the combined offering forward. Its current services include broker retention scoring, repricing assessment and refinancing analysis across the book, with InstantAPPLY and RateTraker included for active customers according to Sherlok’s website. New-customer onboarding has been paused while the rollout continues, so brokers evaluating entry today should confirm current availability directly rather than assuming sign-up works.
Note the distinction when reading older material: descriptions of Hound’s consented open-banking monitoring describe the former platform. They demonstrate what the merged business built on, but they are not proof of any specific feature operating identically today.
Reading Retention Scores With Clear Eyes
Sherlok’s own agreement includes a caution worth quoting to any team member: scores may be inaccurate, and products the system identifies may prove unsuitable for a particular customer’s circumstances. That caveat does not diminish the tool; it locates responsibility correctly. The software nominates candidates for repricing or refinance conversations, but the broker still runs suitability checks before recommending anything, because automated flags carry no advice licence.
Treat the output as a work queue rather than a recommendation engine: verify rates, check the client’s actual position and document your reasoning the same way you would for an opportunity you found yourself.
Making Retention Technology Pay For Itself
- Connect it to your systems: monitoring data only changes behaviour when it flows into the CRM and diary your team already uses, so configure alerts into real tasks rather than another inbox.
- Benchmark the results: track review completion rates and retained-loan percentages against your own history and industry benchmarking figures, because a subscription that moves those numbers justifies itself.
- Keep the human contact: software finds the moment; the broker’s judgement and genuine client relationships close the conversation. Automated emails alone retain nobody.
The Takeaway On Hound And Sherlok
Hound Group’s story ended as a merger, not a closure: the retention-monitoring problem it attacked remains real, and Sherlok now sells the solution set with scoring, repricing and refinance assessment at its core. For brokers weighing the category, the lesson from both brands is consistent: pick monitoring tools that feed your workflow, measure whether they lift your client retention, and keep the final suitability judgment human.
Before subscribing to anything in this category, list the ten largest loans in your back book and their fixed-term expiry dates. If you cannot produce that list in five minutes, you have found the gap retention software exists to close.
