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At the halfway point of 2023, UMortgage is delighted to achieve a massive financial milestone—$1 billion in funded loan volume so far this calendar year. The platform signaled intent to continue to scale after a record-breaking year of growth in 2022, and the investments put in place previously have laid the foundation that enabled UMortgage to surpass its 2022 funded volume just 21 weeks into the new year. Ian Twaddle, a UMortgage loan originator, and his team originated the loan that officially brought UMortgage above $1 billion funded for the year. The Pennsylvania-based LO has been with the platform since October 2022 and has seen their production increase while relationships improve since making the move to UMortgage. “We throw around the phrase ‘all in’ a lot, but Anthony [Casa] has truly gone ‘all in’ over and over—especially with Operations,” said Ian. “At UMortgage, we’re never settling. Rather, we’re constantly improving our Operations processes and standards until they’re the best in the business. That’s what makes it possible for me and the team to do the business we have been doing.” UMortgage was able to accomplish this milestone before the halfway point of the year because of multiple investments into its infrastructure in 2022 with a long-term vision for sustainable success in mind. Prioritizations were made to spur continued exponential growth, starting at the top with its Executive Leadership team, then making their way throughout the organization with revitalizations for recruiting, onboarding, training, and coaching. These tenants laid the groundwork for UMortgage to continue to attract top talent and scale at an increasing rate throughout 2023 and beyond. In the last 12 months, UMortgage has been carefully curating an award-winning Executive Leadership team that ensured alignment across all departments and led short-term projects that paved the path towards making its long-term vision attainable. Gil Arbitsman, CFO and 2023 HousingWire Finance Leader, was brought on board to set financial structures in place that allowed UMortgage to acquire top talent and continue to scale. Kayla Lopez, SVP of Strategy and 2023 HousingWire Rising Star, helped develop internal strategies to help team members acclimate as the platform grew exponentially. And finally, Corie Meredith, VP of Marketing & 2023 HousingWire Marketing Leader, led UMortgage’s marketing strategies to attract new LOs to the platform and enable those LOs to grow & strengthen referral partner relationships. Once the UMortgage’s leadership was aligned, the platform underwent an overhaul of its recruiting, onboarding, training, and coaching strategies to ensure consistent standards were set across the entire organization. This uniform understanding of roles and responsibilities enabled UMortgage to seamlessly scale and welcome new Loan Originators to the platform without disrupting their preexisting pipelines. “We’re thrilled to have hit $1 billion in funded loans so early in the year,” said Rob Pieklo, UMortgage’s VP of Revenue. “We laid the groundwork to make this kind of production growth possible, but it was achieved thanks to the buy-in from everyone across the organization. $1 billion isn’t the final goal, though. We’ll be continuing to fine-tune our processes and develop team members in-house to continue to scale throughout the rest of the year and beyond.” After acquiring Dallas-based NXT Mortgage, Hodgson—the former NXT President & Co-Founder—earned the position as UMortgage’s Vice President of Growth to help identify areas for expansion and strategies to attract top talent in those regions. Most recently, those areas include the Midwest—specifically the Ohio Valley area—and the Southeast. This year, UMortgage has welcomed Ravi Patel’s Ohio Valley Mortgage Group and Patrick Stoy’s MC Mortgage Group, located in Northern Kentucky and Wilmington, North Carolina, respectively. UMortgage’s growth doesn’t end here, however. The platform is currently fine-tuning its Operations processes with a platform-wide initiative called “Operations 1.62”. It is also rolling out a robust coaching platform that connects Loan Originators throughout the organization with experts across the mortgage industry and beyond. UMortgage plans to double its production in the second half of the year; follow this link for a transparent look at the platform’s plans to grow and the ways that it is helping Loan Originators grow their business in any market.

There’s been no shortage of speculation regarding the future of real estate and the housing market. Are we in a bubble? If so, is that bubble about to pop? In late May, Anthony Casa, UMortgage President & CEO, was joined by Logan Mohtashami, Lead Analyst at HousingWire, to take a deep dive into the metrics that have shaped the housing market both recently and long term in their Forecasting the Future event. The pair analyzed the effects of low inventory, wildly fluctuating mortgage rates, and appreciating home values and how these three factors might shape the future of the real estate market and the housing industry. Logan used his robust market knowledge to analyze the data prior to the 2008 Housing Crisis and compare it to the events that shaped the current state of real estate. So, if you’re wondering if the housing market is going up in flames, you’re in the right place. Below, we’ll delve into the current state of the housing market, the differences between now and 2008, and what you can expect for the remainder of 2023 and beyond. What’s the Current State of the Housing Market? It’s no secret that the real estate market is in a challenging place. A period of record low rates and rising sales numbers were immediately followed by the biggest sales collapse in one year in 2022. “This is one of the most frustrating dynamics of housing,” said Logan while analyzing housing sales data. “On one side, everyone has a good loan and a very low total housing cost. On the other side, this creates housing inflation that we’ve never seen before.” This period of housing inflation has had a domino effect on demand and inventory. Those who couldn’t buy a home while rates sat at record-low figures have either been priced out by the lofty mortgage rates in this current market or hold apprehension to buy a home in this market. On the other side of the aisle, current homeowners aren’t listing their homes. Keep in mind that people don’t sell their homes to be homeless; a traditional seller is also a traditional buyer. These rate fluctuations have created more apprehension when it comes to individuals listing their homes, which is a negative hit to both supply and demand. In the graph below, you can see housing inventory data for the last 7 years. Although inventory isn't quite at its lowest like it was in 2022, it's still significantly lower than what we see in a more 'normal' market. “I don’t like to say that this is a housing bubble that we’re in right now,” Logan explained. “This was simply too many people chasing too few homes. When that occurs and it’s a supply-driven market, you can see prices accelerate out of control in a very short amount of time.” “Don’t overcomplicate it,” continued Logan. “Lower rates, demand gets better, housing is stabilized; that’s the marketplace we’re in right now. We aren’t seeing a repeat of what happened in 2022, and the purchase application data is backing that up. Since November 9th, we’ve had 18 positive purchase application data weekly prints versus 8 negatives. That’s your housing market story currently.” There are so many factors wedging the housing market between a rock and a hard place. But does that mean that we should anticipate a housing market crash on the horizon? Let’s talk about it. What’s Different Between the 2008 Housing Crisis & Now? If you’ve seen anything about the housing market on the news, you’ve probably seen financial analysts compare the current state of housing to the 2008 Housing Crisis. While there might be the same fear, uncertainty, and doubt surrounding housing right now, 2008 welcomed several regulations to better protect consumers from predatory lending. There have been laws regarding lending practices, credit, foreclosures, and bankruptcy put in place to prevent history from repeating itself. Take a look at the graph below outlining the number of consumers with new foreclosures and bankruptcies in the last 20 years. The difference in data from 2003 to 2011 and 2012 to 2023 is striking. In 2005, the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005 (BAPCPA) made multiple changes to the United States Bankruptcy Code – most notably that it became more difficult for consumers to file for bankruptcy. That’s why you’ll see that red line drop-off. Then, in 2010, Congress enacted the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. This law enforced a sweeping reform of the American financial system by “improving accountability and transparency in the financial system, to end ‘too big to fail’, to protect the American taxpayer by ending bailouts, to protect consumers from abusive financial services practices, and for other purposes.” To put it simply, these laws work in tandem to ensure that individuals can only qualify for a mortgage if they’re qualified to borrow the large sums of money needed to buy a home. These regulations protect consumers from the all-too-common predatory lending practices. These laws, combined with the increase in popularity of the 30-year fixed mortgage (rather than an adjustable-rate mortgage), ensure that homeowners are shielded from inflationary costs and rapidly rising rates. “The United States has the best 30-year fixed and is one of the few countries that promote a 30-year fixed product,” said Logan. “That 30-year mortgage keeps that total housing debt cost at the same level while your wages rise. So even though inflation is rising, your total housing cost in a sense would be lower or the same.” So, if you have clients who are worried about getting burned by another housing market crash, you can quote Logan: “We just don’t have the credit system in this country to allow for the events that cumulated into the 2008 Housing Crisis.” What Can We Expect from Housing Moving Forward? Now that we’ve cleared the air, what can we expect to happen to the housing market moving forward? Fixing inventory is a tricky issue. As mentioned before, the average mortgage rate sitting around the 7% range creates an issue of affordability, especially for homeowners paying a low total housing cost thanks to the rate they got in 2020 or 2021. However, rates decreasing will also create greater demand as first-time homebuyers and investors flock back to the housing market. Because the housing market is a supply-driven market, what needs to happen to create the right balance and fix the issue of demand? According to Logan, “Demand needs to stay weak for long enough to allow inventory to increase and for us to see ‘days on market’ grow. Nothing good happens in the housing market when ‘days on market’ are in the teens or less.” It all comes back to stability. Slowing inflation and a weaker labor market will see rates start to drop closer to the 5% range. If they can stay in that range for a prolonged period to shoulder the initial influx of demand, then homes should stay on the market longer and allow inventory to slowly accumulate. At UMortgage, we’re homeownership advocates. This means that our Loan Originators work to educate homebuyers on every facet of the homebuying and homeownership processes to ensure that they’re empowered and confident in the decisions they make. The Forecasting the Future event with HousingWire is one of the many opportunities that UMortgage LOs have to learn about the market and methods to navigate it in its different states directly from industry experts. UMortgage’s LOs are creating life-changing opportunities through homeownership with coaching from the industry’s leading minds, robust lender optionality, competitive rates, an innovative tech stack, and an efficient operations process. Check this out if you want to learn more about the platform’s design to help LOs, borrowers, and real estate agents navigate this changing market.

In 2022, the UMortgage platform saw tremendous growth across the board with an exponential increase in the number of team members, loan originators, national footprint, and, most importantly, homeowners served. This year of accelerated development for the mortgage platform was capped by the year’s most successful quarter in Q4. To provide all individuals within the organization full transparency into the investments that allowed for this growth, the physical growth metrics, and the targeted areas for continued growth, President & CEO, Anthony Casa, hosted UMortgage’s Q4 Investor Call alongside CFO, Gil Arbitsman. “We believe this level of transparency creates accountability throughout our organization and helps our team members connect the work we are doing daily with the overall performance of our business,” said Casa. “We are incredibly excited about the exponential growth we have experienced over the last year and what we expect in the future.” An overarching theme of the investor call was UMortgage’s ability to grow during a historically poor quarter for the mortgage industry. UMortgage made several financial investments to restructure the platform and spur its growth, all of which paid dividends through Q4 and into Q1 of 2023. The UMortgage platform was built to solve the pain points that all loan originators experience, whether their background is at a retail mortgage company or a brokerage. These investments allowed UMortgage to emphasize the ways that they resolve these issues. Growth Signaled by High-Profile Recruitment A signal that UMortgage was best suited to address LO's most common pain points was sent to the rest of the mortgage industry when the platform announced in December of 2022 that it had hired mortgage broker advocate and icon, Todd Bitter, to be its Chief Sales Officer. Bitter boasts more than 25 years of experience within the mortgage industry and has spent the last five years prioritizing the education of fellow brokers to replicate the success he’s seen as one of the industry’s top producers. UMortgage’s ability to solve industry pain points also played a key role in its recruiting strategies as it acquired the #1 brokerages in both Ohio and Texas. The acquisitions of Dallas-based NXT Mortgage—the nation’s fastest-growing brokerage—and Breon Price’s Cincinnati-based branch of Motto Mortgage served as the catalysts to positively impact homebuyers in the Texas and Ohio markets and increase its recruiting footprint in those regions; 168 new loan originators from Ohio, Texas, and beyond were welcomed to UMortgage, more than doubling its roster from Q3. An increase in loan originators also led to an increase in homeowners served by the platform. UMortgage LOs managed a 70% year-over-year increase and an 11% quarter-over-quarter increase in homeowners served in Q4. They also more than doubled the number of rate locks in Q4 of 2022 with a 96% year-over-year increase. Investing in Employees at UMortgage Internally, one of the marquee initiatives of Q4 was to change UMortgage’s holding company from Premier Processing LLC to UMortgage LLC. This initiative allowed UMortgage to launch UShares—an employee stock option program that allows all team members to buy equity into the company as it continues to grow. UShares was officially launched midway through Q1 of 2023 thanks to those investments made in Q4. UMortgage also acted proactively by bolstering its Operations teams and proactively training new team members to support the influx of new LOs and the increased volume which would follow. This allowed those new LOs to hit the ground running upon joining the platform while avoiding any bottleneck as loans are processed and closed. Laying the Foundation for Growth in 2023 The investments made in Q3 and Q4 of 2022 helped set the stage for a historic Q1, and likely another groundbreaking year of growth for UMortgage. The platform has already started 2023 with plenty of momentum as it doubled its lock volume from Q4 of 2022 in the first quarter of the new year. During the call, Casa highlighted a goal to fund +2,000 loans monthly in Q4 of 2023. Aside from the continued growth of UMortgage’s roster of LOs, UMortgage will also invest in the development of its current LOs through a LO coaching program which will provide the tools and knowledge needed to increase an individual's average monthly funded loans by 50%. This growth isn’t stopping any time soon. The UMortgage platform plans to continue to create life-changing opportunities through homeownership with the brightest LOs in the country. Every Wednesday at 2pm ET, Casa shares how Loan Originators Powered by UMortgage are set up for success with a community of industry experts and fellow LOs to lean on, a growing selection of lenders and loan products, and best-in-class support staff that helps LOs focus on what they do best—originate loans.

On February 28th and March 1st, UMortgage brought together more than 150 of its loan originators, Operations staff, corporate leaders, and team members for its Relationships Not Transactions Summit. This two-day event hosted at the Four Seasons in UMortgage’s hometown of Philadelphia sought to emphasize the importance of genuine, authentic relationships to turn referral partners from surface-level business transactions into life-long alliances. The event broke down these relationship-boosting tactics into three key actions: attract, engage, and retain. By hitting these three measures, individuals can connect on a deeper level with their referral partners and foster a working relationship that can stand the test of time. “The Relationships Not Transactions Summit was an incredible couple of days for us to come together as a team to strengthen our relationships, learn, share, and get better individually and collectively,” said UMortgage President & CEO, Anthony Casa. “Our people are what makes us special, our relationships are what makes us most valuable, and when we share that value with members of our local communities, we can really make an impact.” During the event, overarching themes included the importance of establishing a foundation of trust, ensuring your relationships are reciprocal instead of one-sided, and that consistently providing value can make oneself a go-to resource. After all, with rates rising once again, a world-class client experience for both borrowers and agents is even more paramount. To help one another grow as a team and continue to improve that client experience—which has earned UMortgage an industry-best 95 net promoter score—attendees shared their personal experiences and tactics to attract, engage with, and retain those partners and clients, as well as ideas to further build upon that experience. In fact, a highlight of the event’s first day was a panel led by four UMortgage’s LOs: Jay Bunte, Keena Gehringer, David Koch, and Kristen Morgan. They shared specific strategies that they employ in their local communities to lift one another up and connect with others in the real estate industry on a more-genuine level, such as charming charity events, engaging educational seminars, locally sourced baked goods, and friendly neighborhood forums. Success also requires recognition to maintain a positive environment centered around individual and collective growth. Along with a record month for funded loans, Casa presented awards to individuals within the organization who exemplify each of UMortgage’s five core values. Recipients were a mix of loan originators, operations leaders & team members, and corporate team members. The award winners were as follows: Create Strong Communities Award: David Koch (Loan Originator) & Natalie Mothorpe (Closer)  Experience is Everything Award: Sonja Thomas (Loan Processor) & Denisa Hyseni (Operations Team Leader)  Get Better Every Day Award: Melanie Lynch (Director of Talent Acquisition) and Adam West (Loan Originator)  Relationships Not Transactions Award: Bill Kessler (Human Resources Team Leader) & Shaun Hamman (Branch Manager)  Own the Moment Award: Victoria Blackie (Loan Originator) & Roberto Rellini (Operations Team Leader and Escalation Manager)  The UMortgage platform has grown in a shrinking market by identifying the pain points of our current loan originators in their previous companies—whether that be a retail shop or their own brokerage—and addressing those pain points with value-based solutions. After a record month for loans funded this February, it’s clear that UMortgage’s platform allows loan originators to win over referral partners and clients in any market. If you’d like to learn more about the platform’s four-pronged approach to success, sign up for the weekly UMortgage Discovery Meeting, which is hosted by Casa every Thursday at 2pm ET.