AS THE HOUSING market languished following the financial crisis of 2008, homebuilders were anxiously looking for loan products that could help them sell new houses. Brandon Hansen pointed them toward the HECM for Purchase, a product rolled out in 2009 by the Federal Housing Administration (FHA). Hansen had been a forward mortgage loan originator, but he quickly saw the appeal of the reverse mortgage option. “Back then, you could allow a client to buy a $400,000 home on a $200,000 budget. Today, it is a $500,000 home on a $300,000 budget,” says Hansen, Utah principal lending manager for Cherry Creek Mortgage LLC in St. George, UT. Now, more than a decade later, Hansen figures his firm is among the top originators of the HECM for Purchase in the U.S. And he sees potential in the product to make further inroads in a time of rising interest rates and high inflation. The product essentially allows a senior borrower to put less money down on a new home and still avoid a mortgage payment. But even after a decade on the market, consumers, real estate agents and builders still struggle to wrap their heads around the product, loan originators say. “I’ve been doing this for over a decade, and to this day, a lot of people are just unfamiliar with the reverse mortgage as a purchase transaction,” says Carlos Camargo, a reverse mortgage specialist and branch manager for Open Mortgage LLC in Ventura, CA. How It Works While many seniors opt to age in place, some opt to move into new homes closer to family and friends. Others want to downsize into retirement communities with amenities they don’t have in their existing homes. Grow Your Business Through HECM for Purchase Experts Discuss Evolution of Niche Market By Joel Berg Brandon Hansen 24 REVERSE MORTGAGE / SEPTEMBER–OCTOBER 2022
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