Well I can't say it's been a Happy year for us in the mortgage industry. In my talks and travels the stories I hear are quite sad, brokers not knowing where their next job will be, loan officers and managers in California; in the heart of the mortgage industry who can't move because their home values have decreased to the point of taking a 25-30% loss on their home. People who were employeed with big mortgage companies waiting tables and working as bartenders, not to suggest there is anyting wrong with the professions, but it goes to show how significant the surplus of mortgage professionals are. So where is all of this going? Well if you're like me you get up each morning at 5:30 grab your coffee and the copy of the journal and begin to page through article upon article describing each author's version of doomsday. The very next day, what a surprise, there is hope in the mortgage industry. The fed decreased the rate a quarter point and wall street has settled somewhat. The fact is, nobody knows where it is going. With majority of adj arms due in Q4 of 2007 and Q1 2008 the worst is yet to come. Compounded with decreased home vaulations many believe we are on the verge of a resession in mid 2008.

As a mortgage professional what do you do? First and foremost if you are still in the industry do not assume you job is stable. One of my first bosses gave me some really good advise a long time ago he said, "the very first day of your new job is when to update your resume, face it kid, you really never know from one day to the next". Also begin to look at your overall skills you have achieved in your career and if you can develop new skills to keep yourself fresh in the marketplace. If you have time, take some classes that you believe will make you more marketable. How are your networking skills? Take this opportunity to drop people in your network an e-mail. It might not be tomorrow or a even a few months from now but you want to feel comfortable if and when that time comes so you can inform your contacts you are in play. Consider this, what would want to do right now if you could not stay within the mortgage industry? Perhaps some of the career choices you are thinking about could perfectly be adaptable to your current job.

Warm transfers are really taking a front step in place of paper leads. The quality can be determined much quicker than paper leads and feedback from loan officers is almost instantaneous. This allows less spoilage on your marketing dollars. Recently Los Angeles-based Low.com, announced that is launched a new warm transfer program. You can read the full story here.
You can read the full story here.

A couple of companies have asked me if there is any success with trigger leads. well from my experiences they require much work and effort. An energetic loan officer will have some success but I would not look to trigger leads for a solution to your lead supply. Also very recently local governments have taken a very hard stance on them. Here is an article I would suggest you read before you consider trigger leads.
Story Here.

For My LinkedIn profile.

October was definitely a month for brokers to vent to me. Some have stopped using Internet leads all together. Their stories all seem to have one common element. Customers have been hounded to the point they no longer want to speak to a broker. This leads me to my frustration and our overall expectations with respect to Internet leads. Are brokers expecting too much with the ever shrinking origination volumes? The chart below shows the story. The later part of 2006 and all of 2007 have seen origination volumes significantly decrease.



So what does this mean for Internet lead companies; less available inventory. It's that simple. We cannot expect the lead company to have the same volume of leads they did last year or the last six months for that matter. I think we have to take a hard look at a lead company and its operations and come to grips with some realities. Each day the lead company spends thousands on advertising to generate their leads. There obviously needs to be an effective return on these advertising dollars. So here is the million dollar question. If their lead prices are not increasing and they are still able to provide the same volume of leads and can guarantee that the consumer will only receive 3-4 telephone calls, you need to ask them how this is possible. It is getting extremely difficult to cost effectively generate mortgage leads online. If a lead company is telling you their lead prices are going up that is the reason and we have to accept the reality if we want to continue to purchase Internet leads. Each lead company is going after the same customer and there are incremental costs to capture that ever shrinking customer base. The lead buyer needs to bare that cost otherwise more and more lead companies will be getting out of the business.