The National Association of Mortgage Field Services wrapped its 2026 Alignment Exchange conference earlier today at the Embassy Suites in Frisco, Texas having apparently aligned on one thing above all others: Labor does not exist. It wasn’t unexpected. The conference had the sad feeling like the end of an era and the smell of a nursing home that one could not drown out with the cheap whiskey served. Once famous for dramatic events, the newly rebranded NAMFS event under delivered. Not discussed but on everyone’s mind was the NAMFS President, Chad Rulo’s lawsuit against his fellow A2Z Field Services member and Black Dome’s President Amie Sparks.
The event ran May 4 and 5, kicking off Monday at noon with a social outing to Puttery Dallas before the expo floor opened, and closing Tuesday afternoon. Two partial days. That is the full measure of what an organization claiming to represent a multibillion dollar industry could muster in 2026.
The floor plan submitted to attendees tells the rest of the story without editorial assistance. Thirteen exhibitors. Count them: Earthvisionz, Blasingame Insurance, VRM, Altisource, Innovative Field Services, Verisk, NFR, MFS Supply, SingleSource, ADEvantage Technologies, York-Jersey Underwriters, Dawgs, and NAMFS itself occupying booth 13. The booths were arranged around what appears to be a hotel ballroom partition wall in the backwaters of Texas. This is the industry’s annual showcase event.
The presences are instructive. Altisource sits at booth 4, currently mid-execution on Project 45, with Granite brand positioning underway and the Onity-Altisource order flow raising questions that have not been answered publicly. Verisk occupied booth 6 — the sole national-scale work order software provider in the space, having absorbed PPW via Xactware in 2006 and acquired Pruvan in May 2022. Verisk attends because Verisk always attends as NAMFS is in essence Verisk. They hold the infrastructure regardless of who is fighting whom. And there was SingleSource in booth 9, the same company whose work order sent an inspector home with a criminal trespass citation now permanently embedded in the National Crime Information Center database, while paying the $150 fine and moved on. They show up to the trade show. The inspector carries the record.
LinkedIn social engagement from the conference amounted to one or two comments per post. For a two-day industry event in a multibillion dollar sector, that is not a social media presence. That is a form letter.
Meanwhile, the people NAMFS does not discuss drove to their routes on Monday and Tuesday same as always and paid at the pump. The AAA national average for regular unleaded stood at $4.483 per gallon as of May 5, representing a roughly 35-cent surge in a single week. The all-time record high for regular unleaded is $5.016, set June 14, 2022 — 53.3 cents away. Diesel tells a starker story: $5.659 per gallon today against the all-time record of $5.816 set June 19, 2022. Sixteen cents. The Strait of Hormuz has been effectively closed to normal shipping since early March. Summer driving season has not started. There is no credible forecast that prices retreat before either of those conditions changes.
Fuel surcharges were not on the agenda. They were not mentioned from the stage. They did not appear in the published session titles. They are not a NAMFS concern because NAMFS is not a labor organization. It never has been. The distinction matters when an inspector collecting $7 to $9 per occupancy check is absorbing fuel costs approaching the all-time record while the order mills who set that pay rate hold booths and drink tickets at a miniature golf social in Frisco.
The industry pays inspectors $7 to $9 per initial occupancy or vacant property follow-up. That rate has not materially changed in years. The mortgage field services ecosystem, by any reasonable measure of current FHA delinquency data — now running above 11% — is generating north of $4 billion annually in field services activity alone, with excess volume above historical norms running approximately $4.1 billion due to FHA delinquencies sitting more than 300 basis points above the long-term baseline. The people closest to that volume, doing the physical assessments and preservation work, got thirteen booths and two half-days and no mention whatsoever.
NAMFS describes its mission as bringing together industry leaders dedicated to advancing excellence in mortgage field services, and credits its sponsors with fostering education and collaboration across the community. A co-host sponsorship ran $22,000. A standard member booth ran $1,500. That is not partnership, that is Eric Miller’s salary being compensated.
Labor was not invited to attend. Labor was not invited to speak. Labor, in the NAMFS universe, exists as a line item to be managed when the market turns — not as a constituency with a fuel bill, a NCIC record, or a right to be in the room.
Thirteen booths. Two half-days. Not a word.
