to the massive amount of home appreciation that our seniors have. Home appreciation was outpacing the rate increase for a little while, but it seems like now the expected rates have penciled principal limits down and pushed a lot of people out of the market. Offsetting this somewhat is the decline in forward mortgage applications, which are at a 20-year low, so niche program offerings are favorable right now to all originators. Reverse mortgages and home renovation loans that Plaza offers are gaining a lot of popularity. RM: That’s great news that you’re seeing more interest from traditional mortgage loan officers wanting to expand into reverse. What’s the biggest challenge in onboarding loan officers and preparing them to be successful? MR: Loan officers have more time to investigate this program more closely. We have an onboarding process where we show a loan officer some basic numbers, we present a quote and then we show how the transaction works. We provide training resources on the front end. We get strong attendance for our reverse mortgage webinars companywide. They get familiar with reverse mortgages. They look at the transaction. Then, they begin to work closely with our staff to iron out the details of the questions and so forth, so they can be successful in presenting the program properly. RM: Are your wholesale partners based primarily in California or all over the country? MR: Plaza is licensed in all 50 states but 36 states for reverse. We have account executives, brokers and correspondents throughout the entire country with strong production on the East Coast, Midwest and West Coast. It’s evenly split out there. Large markets, like California, the Eastern Seaboard and the Northeast, carry a lot of production. RM: Where do you see Plaza Home Mortgage five years from now? MR: We want to be the service leader in this program. We will continue to refine our processes, so that loans are moved through the system as efficiently as possible. We will continue to provide and enhance the necessary resources for brokers to learn and communicate accurately to the senior clientele. And we want to help our brokers understand the guidelines, as it relates to the underwriting piece, so that they can satisfy conditions and move loans through underwriting promptly. We don’t want to be closing loans in 45 to 60 days. We want our turn times to be 20 to 30 days on this program. From the Top continued from page 13 From the Top 888.369.1573 | HTLWHOLESALE.COM HighTechLending, Inc. All Rights Reserved. NMLS #7147 (nmlsconsumeraccess.org). For more information on licensing please visit www.hightechlending.com/compliance-information 14 REVERSE MORTGAGE / NOVEMBER–DECEMBER 2022
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