RTC Cites Progress in Computerized System
The article on the Resolution Trust Corp.’s nationwide real estate computerized database, “S&L; Agency’s Sales Data Found Seriously Flawed” (Sept. 25), is fraught with inaccurate and outdated information.
The characterization of RTC’s Real Estate Owned Management System as being “rendered virtually useless by missing and confusing data” begs the question as to who is being confused. Certainly not the people served by this system.
Contrary to the suggestion that REOMS will not be fully functional before the end of the year, all of RTC’s regional, field and sales offices--totaling more than 2,500 users--have been connected to the system since July 15.
The article significantly distorts the cost of developing REOMS. The $24-million cost cited in the article includes initial development costs of $3 million, as well as operational costs over six years. The article also fails to note that the system’s hardware will be used for other operations within RTC.
Unprecedented in its scope and utility, REOMS contains data on 45,000 properties for sale nationwide as well as 30,000 properties already sold by RTC.
In developing and implementing REOMS, RTC anticipated problems in getting accurate data and recognized that information placed in the system would have to be updated and verified. The information for each property listed in this system is provided by hundreds of different savings and loans, each with its own method of record keeping. Unfortunately, the quality of those records often is poor.
This is exactly the reason RTC--and not the General Accounting Office, as the article implies--commissioned an independent study by Andersen Consulting. This study, completed in June, while RTC still was in the early stages of upgrading the system’s data, has been a valuable tool in determining the amount of effort necessary to get the most accurate information possible.
The study indicated that there was an average error rate of 16% to 26% in a sampling of property listings nationwide. Understandably, integrating data from several different sources into one system involves some potential for error. Given the complexity and scope of the information being processed, the margin of error identified in the report was not unexpected by RTC.
More important is the fact that RTC has made significant progress in developing and implementing automated systems to meet RTC’s mission requirements.
DAVID C. COOKE
Washington, D.C.
The writer is executive director of the Resolution Trust Corp.
