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Blog Post
NewsMarch 21, 2024
The NAR Settlement and its Impact on Homebuyers, Real Estate Agents, and Loan Officers
On Friday, March 15th, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) agreed on a settlement for the ongoing real estate commission lawsuits with $418 million paid in damages and several rule changes that impact the overall homebuying process. These rule changes include the abolishment of the “Participation Rule” which previously required selling agents to display the buyer agent compensation for each listing on the Multiple Listing Service (MLS). Below, we outlined how the NAR settlement will directly impact real estate agents, homebuyers, and loan officers as they conduct business throughout 2024 and beyond. This piece will be updated as new information is received regarding the settlement. Last update: March 25, 2024. How the NAR Settlement Impacts Real Estate Agents The NAR settlement and subsequent rulings will have the greatest impact on real estate agents, and more specifically agents who are representing prospective homebuyers. Following the settlement, the MLS—a service used by buy-side agents to find new listings for their clients and connect with listing agents to negotiate a deal—will no longer display the exact buyer agent compensation. The settlement also ruled that buyer agents must have a signed agreement with the homebuyer they represent with this rule expected to take effect in July 2024. As of right now, there is no mandatory verbiage needed in these agreements beyond written confirmation that the homebuyer is choosing to work with the agent. While these are major changes in a commission-based industry, it doesn’t necessarily mean that the homebuying process as it is known will be uprooted. Although buyer agent compensation won’t be listed in the MLS, it can still be negotiated between the buyer and the seller and facilitated by the buy-side and listing agents. Moreover, buyer agent compensation can be legally shared by the listing agent to the buyer’s agent or advertised alongside a listing in marketing materials as long as it’s not on the MLS. So, in most cases, a buyer agent can still see what they could earn and negotiate compensation before an offer is submitted. At the end of the day, real estate agents provide a bounty of value to the homebuyers they serve. For those shopping for their home, the market expertise, neighborhood know-how, and experienced perspectives offered by licensed real estate agents are invaluable throughout the homebuying process and should be demonstrated in the now-mandated buyer-broker agreements. How the NAR Settlement Impacts Homebuyers The major change brought forth by the NAR settlement that prospective homebuyers will notice is the required agreement that they will sign before they start working with their real estate agent. This rule will go into effect in July 2024. These agreements will likely provide a comprehensive overview of the services provided by their real estate agent and, upon signing, will confirm the buyer’s commitment to work solely with their buy-side agent to buy their home and that the agent will be compensated for brokering the purchase of the home. Through this process of negotiating the buyer-agent agreement, there is greater room for negotiation on the terms in which an agent is paid. These options include payment via a fixed-fee commission paid directly by the buyer, seller concessions, or a percentage of the listing agents’ commission—the latter of which is how buyer agents have historically been compensated. There is speculation that this ruling combined with a lack of seller-paid agent compensation could see the cost to buy a home fall, but that isn’t necessarily true. In most cases, buyer and listing agent compensation is paid by the seller and built into the listing price of the home. Suppose a seller chooses not to pay the buy-side agent’s compensation or the listing agent opts against sharing their commission as part of the negotiations. In that case, buyers will instead have to pay out of pocket for their real estate agent representation. This is expected to be an exception as selling agents need to provide incentives to generate interest in their listings, and that incentive has traditionally been through buyer agent compensation. For many homebuyers, and especially those buying for the first time, coming up with the extra cash to pay their agent’s commission on top of what’s needed for their down payment or closing costs can be challenging. Following these rule changes, it’s still possible for the buy-side agent to be compensated through a seller-paid commission that’s been baked into the price of the home and paid as part of the mortgage. Whether you’re buying your first home or purchasing your next home, working with a licensed real estate professional is hugely beneficial. On top of their market and neighborhood expertise, real estate agents can often spot issues with homes before the inspection to save you from wasted time putting an offer on a home that will end up being a money pit within your first few months or years of living there. If you need to connect with an experienced real estate agent to help you with your home purchase, feel free to reach out to your UMortgage Loan Originator; they will be able to put you in touch with a trusted partner in your area. How the NAR Settlement Impacts Loan Officers Loan officers are the party that’s least impacted by the recent NAR rulings as lender compensation is already included in closing costs. There is still plenty of value that real estate agents offer both homebuyers and loan officers throughout the homebuying process. Because of that, this ruling likely won’t change the working relationship between LOs and real estate agents. If costs for homebuyers increase, independent mortgage brokers should highlight the lower closing costs available to buyers when they work with a broker rather than historically expensive banks and retail shops. Homeownership is a privilege, and UMortgage is on a mission to create life-changing opportunities through homeownership by making it more accessible for buyers across the nation. If you’re interested in learning more about your buying power or want to find a UMortgage Loan Originator in your area, follow this link to get started.
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Blog Post
NewsMarch 14, 2024
UMortgage Midwest Launches Journey to Create More Accessible Homeownership Opportunities For Midwestern Homebuyers
CINCINNATI, OHIO; March 13, 2024 — UMortgage—a national mortgage company that’s creating life-changing opportunities through homeownership—is proud to announce that its Ohio and northern Kentucky-based branches, UMortgage Cincinnati and Ohio Valley Mortgage, have joined forces to form UMortgage Midwest. Led by Branch Managers, Ravi Patel and Justin Allen, UMortgage Midwest boasts a team of 20 experienced Loan Originators serving homebuyers throughout Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, and beyond. By merging, UMortgage Midwest will align in its strategy to better serve homebuyers and real estate professionals throughout the midwest. “I’m really excited to continue to serve agents and homebuyers to make the homebuying process as a whole more accessible and streamlined,” said Patel. “By combining forces, we have an excellent team of experienced Loan Originators who are eager to help enrich the lives of those in our community through the power of homeownership.” In 2023, the Loan Originators who make up UMortgage Midwest served nearly 600 families throughout the tri-state area. With a unified approach to the way it serves its buyers and partners, UMortgage Midwest is eager to help create more life-changing opportunities through homeownership for local homebuyers. As a whole, UMortgage is coming off its second consecutive year of +100% year-over-year growth and is trending towards doubling its total production again in 2024. The innovative mortgage platform has bested its previous record for locked loan volume three times so far this year, most recently the week of March 6th, and has recorded a 32% increase in families served year-over-year through the first two months of the year. The UMortgage platform is growing at a rapid pace by leading with value and empowering its homebuyers with financial literacy. If you’re interested in learning more about UMortgage’s and UMortgage Midwest’s mission to create life-changing opportunities through homeownership, please visit www.umortgage.com.
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Blog Post
MortgageMarch 12, 2024
UMortgage Posts Company Record for Weekly Lock Volume in Consecutive Weeks
Records are set so they can be broken again, and so far in 2024, UMortgage is putting plenty of fresh ink into its record books. After setting a new company record for lock volume in a week in late January, UMortgage set the pace again less than 30 days later, then one-upped that company record the following week. The week of March 6th, the innovative mortgage platform tallied a company record $73 million in weekly lock volume — $3 million higher than the previous record set the week prior. "Momentum is building in a really positive way for us at UMortgage," said Anthony Casa, President & CEO. "February was one of our best months ever for funded volume and with back-to-back record lock weeks to start March, we're on a fantastic trajectory to fund more than $1 billion in volume by the end of Q2." Having set a company-best for lock volume in a week three times in 2024 has UMortgage on pace for another record-shattering year. The national mortgage company has tallied nearly $400 million in funded volume as of March 1st, a 38.5% year-over-year increase by the same point in 2023. With the tide turning for housing affordability and demand subsequently on the rise, UMortgage is anticipating another year setting the pace for industry-best growth behind a relationship-based sales strategy. Growth-minded loan officers and Branch Managers need a trailblazing platform to foster their production growth. If you’re looking for a platform that will allow your business to thrive, schedule a 1-on-1 with a member of UMortgage’s Business Support team.
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Blog Post
NewsFebruary 29, 2024
UMortgage Launches Level Up Sales Coaching Program to Help Loan Originators Scale Their Businesses
UMortgage is committed to helping its Loan Originators take their production to the next level when they join the innovative mortgage platform. On top of its custom portfolio of marketing materials, around-the-clock Operations support, and robust lender optionality, UMortgage created its Level Up Sales Coaching program to connect its LOs with top producers and leading minds within the mortgage industry. These small-group coaching sessions led by UMortgage leaders and Branch Managers feature innovative technology to track sales activities and improve lead conversion, a structured curriculum to foster individual and collective growth, and valuable resources to offer referral partners and clients. Structured Curriculum Driven By Innovative Technology Level Up Sales Coaching has a lasting impact on its students by breaking down long-term goals into smaller, repeatable sales activities that drive desired outcomes. At the beginning of a Level Up semester, students outline their target gross income and desired work schedule with their coaches. These goals are then plugged into Level Up technology — an app that tracks these targeted figures and presents tangible outcomes such as new leads, credit pulls, pre-approvals, locks, and fundings per month. The actions needed to generate these sales metrics are further broken down into sales activities like phone calls, face-to-face meetings, events hosted, online posts, and casual meetings over lunch or coffee. Level Up’s 60-minute bi-weekly sessions allow students to review their sales activities with their dedicated coaches to determine what’s effective in helping convert sales activities into leads and the subsequent actions that turn leads into funded loans. These groups are broken down into a small setting of 3-to-5 Loan Originators being led by a sales coach, which we’ll expand further on in the next section. Industry-Leading Sales Coaches UMortgage’s Level Up Sales Coaches are carefully selected by its program leaders — Tyler Hodgson, EVP of Growth, and Sam Abazari, Director of Coaching. Among each semester’s coaches are UMortgage’s top-producing branch managers and members of its executive leadership team. By leaning on the expertise of these experienced and successful mortgage professionals, Level Up students can workshop their approach to the different sales activities identified through their Level Up app. With a more intimate classroom setting, students have more time to workshop their approach to their sales activities with their expert coaches. When students are assigned their coach, individual factors such as experience level, loan specialties, and location are all taken into account to ensure students can learn from a teacher who has been in their shoes before. Value Offerings for Real Estate Agent Partners As a member of UMortgage’s Level Up Sales Coaching program, students can invite their real estate agent partners to exclusive monthly training sessions specifically catered to help agents grow their businesses and increase their client conversion rates. Each month, students’ agent partners receive access to a new, unique training session covering various topics, from prospecting to lead conversion, follow-up with past clients, and more. Leading with Proven Results UMortgage’s Level Up Sales Coaching program leads with proven results. Following its first semester, 99% of students said the curriculum made them a better Loan Originator. With tools like SalesScreen, business trackers, and other outlets to set goals and receive incremental advice to achieve them, 96% of students said Level Up helped them increase their sales activities. UMortgage launched the second semester of Level Up in January 2024 with resounding success. Following the consensus of positive achievements found by students during its inaugural semester, the second semester of Level Up saw a record number of registrants, with more than 150 Loan Originators signed up. The success of UMortgage's Level Up Sales Coaching program directly correlates to the record-setting year the innovative mortgage platform had in 2023. With an increase in sales activities seen by its Loan Originators, UMortgage was able to surpass $2 billion in yearly funded volume — a 115% year-over-year increase, UMortgage has used its momentum to fly off the blocks in 2024. Facing another year of record-breaking growth, UMortgage is continuing its mission to make the best Loan Originators maximize their potential and create life-changing opportunities through homeownership for individuals and families nationwide. If you're interested in learning how the tools available on this innovative platform can help you grow your business, register for our bi-weekly Loan Originators Powered by UMortgage call to hear first-hand advice from UMortgage leaders and top producers.
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