Tape
Also known as: data tape, loan tape, bid tape, pool tape
Tape (also called a data tape, loan tape, or bid tape) is the spreadsheet a seller provides to prospective buyers listing every loan available for purchase along with its loan-level details. The name dates back to when this information was literally encoded on magnetic tape reels used by mainframe computers. Today the tape arrives as an Excel file, but the term stuck — and reading it correctly is the skill that separates informed buyers from time-wasters in the secondary mortgage market.
What a Tape Contains
A tape is a spreadsheet with one row per loan and columns of data describing each asset. A small pool from an individual seller might have 5 loans and 10 columns. A bank portfolio might contain 500 loans and 40+ columns — many of which are internal fields that mean nothing to an outside buyer.
There is no industry standard format. Every seller uses their own column headers, abbreviations, and internal asset codes. Your job is to identify the columns that matter for pricing, ignore the noise, and flag gaps where critical information is missing.
Need-to-Have Fields
These seven fields are required to price a loan or proceed with due diligence. If any are missing, request the data from the seller or gather it yourself before submitting an offer.
| Field | Why It Matters |
|---|---|
| Loan number | Unique identifier tying all vendor data back to the correct asset |
| Lien position | Determines your entire pricing model, legal remedies, and contract terms |
| Borrower name | Required for credit reports, skip tracing, and occupancy verification |
| UPB | The outstanding balance — most offers are expressed as a percentage of UPB |
| Property address | Required to value the collateral, check taxes, and assess the local market |
| Last payment date | Calculates months delinquent and statute of limitations exposure |
| Payment amount and terms | Models cash flows and informs loan modification options |
Nice-to-Have Fields
These fields save research time but can be obtained independently if the seller does not provide them:
- Secured status scrub — indicates whether the borrower matches the current property owner
- Senior lien balance — critical for pricing junior liens
- Property tax balance — taxes are a super-priority lien ahead of all mortgages
- Fair market value — anchors your LTV calculation
- Credit report data — borrower FICO, trade lines, and senior lien pay strings
- Occupancy status — owner-occupied, vacant, or tenant-occupied properties require different strategies
Three Common Tape Formats
| Seller Type | Data Quality | What to Expect |
|---|---|---|
| Bank | Raw, coded, requires cleanup | Internal field names, undated FICOs, concatenated borrower names, no property values |
| Secondary market trader | Enriched, segmented | Multiple loan IDs, credit data with dates, FMV from at least one source, vendor-ready borrower data |
| Retail marketplace | Curated, single-asset cards | Readable format, LTV pre-calculated, narrative blurbs — but no bulk data and possible markup |
Red Flags on Any Tape
Watch for missing or zero UPB, blank lien position fields, last payment dates more than six years old (statute of limitations risk), maturity dates in the past, and active bankruptcy or foreclosure codes. These do not automatically disqualify a loan, but they change your pricing and risk assessment.
From Tape to Bid
Reading the tape is step one. The workflow that follows layers additional data on top of what the seller provides: confirm need-to-have fields, classify loans by lien position, calculate equity coverage, assess statute of limitations risk, flag red-flag loans, enrich missing data, then price and submit. For a detailed breakdown of this process, see How to Read a Non-Performing Loan Data Tape.
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