Vantage President shares his thoughts on brokers in a leading Mortgage Industry newsletter.

Preface by Rob Chrisman.  Article from Rob Chrisman’s blog.  HERE

Brokering is alive and well, at least in some parts of the country. “I think it is important that people realize that brokering loans has been around for decades and is still the best way for a borrower and loan officer to go.  Over the past 2 quarters, broker business is the fastest growing sector of our industry, and that isn’t a fluke or mistake.  With all the ‘uncertainty’ behind us from a regulatory perspective, the loan officers are going back to brokering and the wholesale lenders are ready to help them grow and take great care of each borrower that they work with.”

From Oregon Andy W. Harris, CRMS and president & CEO of Vantage Mortgage Group, Inc., scribed, “I could not disagree more with comments about brokers ‘losing control’ over the loan or process when submitting to a wholesale lender. This is actually opposite of the truth providing our ability to choose. What these creditor-employed ‘bankers’ forget to understand is that they are shielded and blinded from what it is to be a ‘true broker’ without the correspondent line or corporate influence. Brokering as a so-called ‘banker’ is nothing like true brokering with the influence of your employer choosing what you can or cannot send, with higher margins to not compete with lines or cause compensation issues. In addition, most send odd programs they cannot do as they call ‘in house’ making the experience not what it should be with wholesale lending. The ‘true’ broker actually has more control than the ‘bankers’ as they refer to themselves. If I need something executed or an exception from a wholesale lender, it is a much different interaction than if this lender employed me. They want our business and then want us happy, so quality ‘good’ Mortgage Brokers have the advantage.  

“As a true broker I benefit by having lenders compete for my clients business and they are judged by pricing, turn-times, communication, overlays, products, and execution (as I should also be judged as a Mortgage Broker in their minds for quality and execution).  If I have a bad experience with turn-times, communication, an underwriter, you name it… I have the ability to correct that mistake on any future files and we set expectations together as business partners. I have my responsibilities for the best quality, compliance, origination, and processing possible when the wholesale lender is responsible for the same quality and compliance, but we prefer them to have the underwriting and closing task to avoid this cost in our rate sheets with additional higher risk and less choice.

“I work for my client, not the lender. This is the only difference in these outdated ‘broker and banker’ titles. We are all TPO’s to the agencies as I’ve yelled for years that appears to fall on deaf ears or to those that have been victims of recruiters and selling the snake oil terms such as false ‘direct lender’ to Realtors, etc.  There are significant advantages to being a Mortgage Broker, especially when you have the most qualified and experienced professionals (in my opinion) under the wholesale channel and working hard to earn our (my clients) business. Again, I cannot reiterate the importance of choice and not steering my clients to higher-cost (in most cases) correspondent lines and employer influences.

“This is where our industry is lost and this is why you see most ‘banker’ resume’s reflecting several companies over the last 8 years and most “brokers” as they still call us have made very few changes.  Most are lost, looking short-term rather than career-minded long-term and what is available to their clients.  Wholesale is a hidden gem and we didn’t buy into the net branch, wholesale is dead, mini-cor, sky is falling circus years ago.  Now is the best time in history to be a ‘true’ Mortgage Broker for us that stuck with it and are established and organized. Again, if you have a bad experience with a lender which may usually only be during high volume… compare and move on. If you have a bad experience with your employer (if employed by a lender rather than independent), you’re in a difficult position. More importantly, your clients are in a difficult position. The more job changes you’re making over the years, the more your clients will feel that you are unstable. As a result you see them begin to stray.

“Most Mortgage Loan Originators are influenced by their employer. I choose for my employer to be the consumer exclusively which gives me a clear head and how I view origination channels. If you want the independent truth about our industry without all the noise and politics, this is it.”