[David] So, James, it’s great to have you on the microphone. Again, as I said in the opening, I have a huge respect for you and I’m really excited. And I’ve gotten to know you more recently, when you were at HousingWire, I got to know you there a little bit, and I’ve gotten to know you now better watching reporting. But those that don’t know your background, tell us about your journey to where you’re at. You’re one of these guys that could have worked at Wall Street Journal, you could work to Bloomberg, you could work to any of the big media brands, but you have chosen a path of independence and going this way. Tell us how you what brought you to this place?
[James] Yeah, no, well, first I really appreciate that. Thank you for having me on, David. the opportunity and have a lot of admiration for what you’ve done in the industry all these years. I feel like a like a lot of people in mortgage, you just kind of find it, right? Like it’s not it’s not like I knew somebody in mortgage and this is kind of how you know I envisioned my life going when I was a kid. And I asked my four-year-old, like, what do you want to be when you grow up and he wants to be a firefighter? Like no one ever says they want to be a mortgage reporter, right? So, but yeah, I mean, like most people in sort of the news business, I started as a news reporter in college in Burlington, Vermont. I moved back to New Jersey after college and I ran a collection of local news websites called Patch. I don’t know if you ever heard of them or you had them where you were living but yeah, so like it was owned by AOL and there were these sort of hyper local kind of one-man band reporting crew. You cover the schools, you cover politics, you cover crime, you cover whatever goes on in these towns. You’re sort of like a like a news celebrity covering a town, right? And you’re often coming up against big established media outlets that have been there free ages. And that’s where I really cut my teeth. And so, you know, I was working, no exaggeration, probably a hundred hours a week, and I didn’t have a social life, and I’ve always been kind of obsessive about work. And so I just made it a plan to be everywhere, to know everyone, and to establish credibility by doing good work and doing it consistently. And so, you know, you you want to be good at your job, you want to build sources, you want to understand how curate news and information for again, we’re talking about a town. And so in this case, it was Ridgewood, New Jersey, which is a really lovely kind of bedroom community outside of New York City. And I love that. I was like a local celebrity, you know, like a like a D list local celebrity, just to be clear and you know, over time people knew that I would be fair, that I would give them an opportunity, I’d share their story, their perspective. And so this is also the age we’re talking about 15 years ago, a little more than 15 years ago, of clicks. And it was obsessive, you know, it was like these companies would require reporters to come up with slideshows of the Memorial Day parade and all of these things to just sort of gin up all of this traffic. And so at the time I was like, you know what? I don’t want to do any of that stuff. How do I get a big amount of traffic to get management off my back so I can do what I feel is the important work, covering the politics, covering the schools, giving people a voice, exploring subjects like homelessness in a wealthy town, like, you know, there are a lot drug use, so many things that I think most local news has abandoned mostly for resources, right? And so that’s the work I wanted to do. But that was not the kind of work that got huge traffic. It wasn’t, you know, what what the the bosses wanted. They wanted me to cover Snooki. do you remember their yeah, Jersey Shore? Yeah. The real housewives. I actually went to school with a couple of their kids. And so I was able to break a couple stories about you know, the real housewives or the cast members of the Jersey Shore getting into trouble, hijinks in you know, in South Jersey but to me, that was very much my earliest cynicism in the industry. It was because the the rigorous, deeply reported stories that required a lot of reporting skill, sourcing, and risk on my part, they weren’t prioritized by management. You know, those were the stories that invited legal review or controversy, you might upset advertisers. And so I found it really frustrating that they cared much more about Bruce Springsteen or Snooky or, you know, pictures of a T ball game because people would click on it for cute kids. And it didn’t have intrinsic meaning, right? And so, you know to read it.
[David] Intrinsic meaning. That’s really good. Because that defines it defines what we see you doing today is you’re digging for intrinsic meaning.
[James] Yeah, that’s a lot of how I see it. And not everyone will agree with that characterization, I think but like so in the news business, you know, we we would call something called the day two story. It’s a follow-up, right? Something big happens on day one, that’s breaking news. Day two is the follow, the day two story. And so traditionally, what would happen is you would write your follow. It would be a meaningful, hey, here’s what we learned on day one, but this is the kind of the next iteration of lifespan of this story, how do we report it? How do we come up with good angles? And what’s happened in news is that’s gotten chopped up into covering it as five different stories with five different headlines. And to me it’s all basically the same. Like the goal is to game an algorithm and it’s not to show up every day and serve the people who are reading it. It’s almost disrespectful to the reader, in my opinion. And not everyone agrees with me. And so what I wanted to do is to set up a sustainable business and do it the right way and treat readers as peers, right? Like so much of the challenges we face in media are that we don’t really understand the people that we’re supposedly working for, you know? And so just kind of fast forward a little bit. So I worked another local job at the Star Ledger, which is nj.com. It’s the biggest news outlet in New Jersey and similar story there. In 2015, I got a job at a company called The Real Deal. I don’t know if you’ve heard of it, David. so this is basically it’s an incredible operation. It’s like the Hollywood reporter for real estate, and it’s mostly commercial real estate and luxury resie. And it’s, you know, I actually I funny story here. so I got that job in large part because during the interview process, I asked a friend of mine who was a junior commercial retail broker. Give me some schooling, you like, hey man, what does this mean? How do I calculate per square foot on this or whatever? And he ended up sharing with me that his company at the time, RKF, was selling or engaged in talks to sell to another firm. Now the deal ended up falling through, but I used this. So I called up the guy who was interviewing me for this job. And I was like, hey, I got a scoop for you. Here’s what’s going on. And so he had his best reporter in that space confirm what I said was true and I think that’s what convinced them to hire me. So I’ve always had sort of that hustle like Yeah.
[David] Which goes to the scoop, which is the need, the mortgage scoop. You’ve always whether it be a community scoop, an industry scoop. I mean, you that’s the thing that is so and it’s the questions you ask. I mean, I’ve sat down with you, or you’ve sat down with me. We’re at a conference. Hey, Dave, can I have a few minutes? And you know, a lot of people and you always say nicely complimentary things, and I do, I mean, and I do have a lot of scoops, some of which I can’t talk about it because I’m under NDAs, but you ask thoughtful questions and it’s and I want to get into some of how you do it. Before we go there, though, two questions I have. The first is when did you know you were talking about your four-year-old wanting to be a fireman? I’m thinking of the parents. I mean, so many of the industry people that are listening to this, in addition to being industry, were parents. And how did you know that when did you know? And I guess how did you figure out that this was the thing you wanted to do? That that that this is your purpose in life? What you wanted to pursue.
[James] Also kind of a funny story. So my father is or was an NYPD detective. And so yeah, so I I’ve always had sort of a an investigative background, I guess one could say. And so my father Yeah, my father retired from the force many years ago and then had a series of kind of quirky odd jobs. He’s kind of a character. and so I always loved mysteries and putting you know the pieces together and I always wanted to uncover the truth and and provide something compelling for people, right? Like narrative is what draws us in and it’s what captures the hearts and the minds. And it’s such a powerful element in just like human connection, right? And so I’ve always been really focused on trying to find professional work that is related to that, without, you know, being a fantasy writer, without being You know, someone in in sort of like the real arts. I’m not an artist. I can’t draw like a turkey hand.
[David]I would argue that you you’re doing you have artists and skills that you’re bringing to that what you do. So I would I’d argue a little bit push back a little bit that you’re not an artist ’cause you are. you may
[James] Well, I’ll take the compliment, but so the other challenge with you know, I I didn’t want to become a detective. I didn’t want to work for the NYPD or another place because I kind of at my core, I I don’t really believe as much in institutionalized authority as maybe a lot of people do. And I would not be a good worker. And so yeah, maybe. you know, again, like there is a need for that and there are people who are quite skilled and quite capable of thriving that environment. I am not.
[David] I agree. Yeah. It’s not, it’s not a statement. Yeah, it’s not a statement putting down anyone that is doing that. It’s just that wasn’t your thing. And I think more people that figure that out, it says, bless the people that are in that and feel somewhat of a calling to do that or a purpose to do that or find their purpose in doing that. Great for them. But that wasn’t your path. So how did you transition into mortgage? Why mortgage? You’re a brilliant investigative reporter type. You could go so many directions and do so well. Why mortgage?
[James] So I ended up getting a job at a housingWire in covid.
[David] Yeah, props out to Housing Wire to recognize the talent they’ve in you. That was yeah, Clayton and the team, they found a gem in you.
[James] Thank you. and so that was August of 2020 and they hired me initially to do mortgage reporting to lead the mortgage beat. And I had covered it a little bit at the real deal, but for those who aren’t familiar, Tier D is more of like a luxury resie slash commercial outfit. And so they don’t really cover the mortgage injury. Like I would bet most of the people there don’t even know what UWM is, you know? And so or I mean, obviously they know Rocket and some others, but that’s not really how they think about their coverage. And so when I took this job, like I had no idea what I was doing. I knew conceptually how a mortgage worked and you know, components of it and kind of basic workflow. But I didn’t understand even the different channels, like what’s the difference between a delegated correspondent and a non del and I mean it’s all a little fuzzy nowadays. But you know, and wholesale versus retail, it’s such an interesting evolution that we’re kind of in the midst of. But I was just drawn to it. And I think it’s because, you know, a lot of the people in the industry are they’re aggressive, they’re savvy, they’ve worked at a million different jobs and they’ve always added another bow to their string. They’ve always done something, you know, to evolve in an industry that is in many ways defined by kind of cyclicality, right? It’s sort of like there are hire cycles, there are fire cycles, there’s refi booms, there’s, you know, survive on purchase.
[David] Yeah. If you look at Jeffrey Moore’s book, you know, which was written about the law of diffusion and innovation, mortgage industry is basically laggards. We are we have suffered from a lack. Now it’s not going on now. We’re starting to see some true innovation starting to happen. Finally, but we’ve been laggards in this industry. Now we’re coming into a season which I can’t wait to get toward the one of the last questions I have for you is about where you see the industry going. But you’re now doing an outstanding job of take doing the scoop. and doing it really differently. How did you choose and find the niche that you’re in, which is a differentiator from other sources? Kudos to all the other sources out there, but you have really carved out a niche. What did you see the need and how did you execute on that?
[James] It’s a good question. I think it kind of comes back to what we talked about a couple of minutes ago, which is I feel that a lot of publishers have lost sight of how to talk to the audience, how to deliver content in a way that people really want it, you know. And so to do that, you need to have some personality, a little sizzle, you need to take some risks, you need to be bold. And all of these qualities are everywhere in the business, right? And I don’t necessarily feel that it’s reflected in the publications that cover real estate and housing and mortgage at large, right? So not just specifically mortgage. And so you know, within my work, like I curse on occasion, I write in shorthand, I use memes, I use jokes, like it’s very referential, it’s very casually written. And that’s because I think of the mortgage scoop as more of like a group text of the industry rather than a trade publication.
[David] Yeah. Great. That’s good. That’s good. A group text for the mortgage industry. I love that.
[James] That’s how I see it, you know, and maybe others would have a different perspective on that. And that’s fine. But I the one of the challenges here is while I break a lot of stories, the framing is always back to the language of the people in the arena, you know, because it’s for them. Like I don’t write it for other journalists. A lot of journalists write for other journalists. They’re looking to get another job or they’re looking for an award or plotits or whatever. But most of the people who read it, like they don’t give a crap about that, you know? And there’s nothing wrong with, you know, writing something to get an award and it doesn’t diminish the work that they do. But if you’re not writing it for very specifically for the people in the industry that you’re ostensibly there to serve, I think you’re kind of missing the mark, or there is at least an opportunity for someone to say, you know what, like let’s think about this differently and let’s put our neck You know, on the line a little bit, right? And so there’s a lot of conservative, I don’t mean in a political sense, but people in the news business are conservative. They’ve been doing things a certain way for many, many years. They have the, you know, inverted AP style pyramid when they write, they have, you know, headlines that have SEO phrases and like those days are already dead. and so it’s just like, how do you engage with people? Give them something that’s actually fun and fresh. and a little dangerous and a little weird and you know is reflective of someone’s personality. and I would like to think that many people like it, but I also know that there are some people who don’t like it. And that’s okay. You know, like I’m okay with that.
[David] Well, I is it do they not like it? Is it that they don’t like it or you’re challenging norms that they don’t like? I mean, I think some people again, again, I don’t mean all due respect this industry. I’ve been in it for fifty-two years. I love this industry, I would have stayed in it. I’m seventy-five years old, I would not continue, I’d retire out, but I can’t. I just something about this industry is at the core of the fabric of our country, it’s a core of a fabric. When you own a home, it’s something at the core of the family unit, there’s so much importance about this that I don’t want to give it out. And I thoroughly enjoy the people in it, like many people like yourself. But let’s get into some of the myths.
[James] I love the people. Yeah. I mean, that’s also why I do this, right? Like I meet some really fun, interesting, weird people who are very skilled and they have really important jobs. Like it’s easy to lose sight of that and kind of get lost in the day to day of everyone’s own personal responsibilities. But I mean, we’re talking about an industry that supports like trillions of dollars in you know, in origination volume every year. Like this is the engine of economic opportunity for so many people in this country and I don’t think that it’s well covered, broadly speaking. I don’t think that, you know, most of the big publications like The Times or Bloomberg or the Wall Street Journal, while they have good individual reporters, they’re not covering it like I’m covering it or the trade publications. And that’s okay. That’s not you know, a negative reflection on them, but it’s a sense of priorities, right? They have different priorities and so they’re not gonna get as close to the action. They’re not gonna serve you know an individual LO or a branch manager or a servicer or, you know, someone again, as I said, in the arena. And so that’s the opportunity to connect and influence people and maybe, you know, give them information that can get them a great new job or get a new client that they can serve or do something meaningful with their work. So that’s always the hope.
[David] Yeah, that’s that’s the hope. But you also add almost edginess to it at times. It’s I think it’s thrown in as like a good spice in a good meal can may bring out the flavors, and you’re brilliant in how you add the seasoning to the stories that you write about. I just think that’s it. But let’s get into some of the misconceptions about how trade media works in the mortgage industry. There are a lot of them, and you’ve touched on some, but go a little bit deeper into that.
[James] Yeah, well there’s a lot of misconceptions. I mean there’s a common one. There’s a misconception that individual reporters and editors at trade publications are like for or against companies. like there’s a big cabal or something. And usually when things turn out a certain way, it’s because a reporter like didn’t have the full context, because they just they didn’t know. Like there’s a lot. I mean, there are so many things I don’t even know. And I’ve been like really in the weeds for a long time covering this. and so that’s often the case or the reporter editor was under a time pressure or they played it safe because a lot of people just don’t want the conflict. They don’t want to get, you know, a nasty call from somebody at a big company who has an endless legal budget. And this is a very litigious industry. I receive probably one to two legal threats a month. so I’ve gotten more than a dozen, you know,
[David] Wow. That means you’re doing your job. That means you’re doing your job, James. I mean, as far as I’m concerned, that means you’re doing your job. That’s a badge of honor. I love it. I think I think I sometimes I don’t think I have the balls to do some of that then, but I’m glad you do. And but and I love how you you’ve challenged me. And I look at your reporting, you’ve challenged me as a podcaster to be a you know, be a little more transparent and less, you know, trying to be in the main flow of things and I mean we bring in the stories, our job is here is to interview people. Your job is to get the scoop. And I that’s why I love what we’re talking about here. How can a mortgage industry participant use media to their advantage? We see people using it in a in a bad way and not effectively. I think it actually hurts them more, but how can they use it to their advantage?
[James] I think there are two ways to think about this. The first is if I were an executive, right, how I would use the media is most of the executives in the industry. This is just my my take on this, are wooden, right? Where they don’t have much of a presence online. They’re not they’re I feel like they’re leaving a lot on the table and they’re missing the opportunities to shape narrative and so they don’t post authentically on LinkedIn or Facebook. They don’t have TikTok. I know some are scared for compliance reasons and that’s valid, but if you don’t have a good compliance person who can tell you, like, hey, you know, don’t reveal like someone’s social security number or like don’t, you know, like there are a lot of like obvious things that you should know not to do, and there are a lot of things that you can do and so there are examples like, do you know Scott Reese? Great guy, right? And so I can’t say I know him well, but I know of Scott. I know who you’re talking about. Yeah.
[James] Yeah, yeah. And so like he’s, for example, really effective at kind of chronicling the industry. So he shares hiring trends, workflow issues, like, you know, people who are really effective at you know, how to navigate difficult situations as a manager. Like these are real humans talking about real issues in the industry. And I would bet dollars to donuts that Scott is able to recruit and retain talent better because his content reflects the actual reality of what’s happening in the industry. And it’s not, you know, promotional, it’s not fluffy. Like it has, again, intrinsic value. And another thing that I think people could do, like, why aren’t you calling Prashant Kopal at Bloomberg or Ben Eisen at the Wall Street Journal with a trend story that can highlight a strategic shift maybe taking place in the industry? And now you guys are maybe ahead of the curve, you know, and on that note, like there are a lot of stories that are eventually picked up by the Times and the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg that originate from maybe, maybe not the right word choice, but that are picked up from trade publications that covered them a month or two prior. You know, like I bet there are a lot of people who’d love to know, like, what are the individual trends happening in like jumbo lending right now? How are people using arms effectively, you know, or certain buy-downs, or when are like buy downs coming back to bite people who’d maybe didn’t budget? You know, thinking that, the two one is gonna, you know, be something I can refi out of like in a couple of years, right? Like there’s a lot of stuff out there that that I think can bring you good publicity and signal to consumers and also other LOs that you’re a savvy operator, that you know how to communicate with people, because that’s also what separates the best LOs from average or poor performers. It’s always communication and systems, right? And I think that’s sort of a signal of sorts that you really get it. You know, you know how to make people more money too, right? Like that’s let’s not be naive about what this means.
[David] Yeah. You know, and you hit on a really good point. That’s I remember Kate Barry when she was at American Banker. It’s great. I I think the world ever always respected her style. She wrote an article and quoted me in it, having to do with, I think it was the time, Country Wipe and that was obviously a issue and Fox Business was just starting up and a guy by Erica Spinano, who is now unfortunately passed away, was was one of the producers there in the bookers. And he called me up and I thought it was a joke, so I hung up on the guy. But here’s an article. He called me back and we formed a very good friendship. And then I was 15 years as a regular in Fox and CNBC. But I share that story not about me because it’s what I how I got there. So many people ask, how did you become such a regular alongside of David Stevens on the mortgage on these major publications, CNBC, Fox, mostly Fox Business. And it was because I put myself out there to be quoted in an article. Now, when it comes to scoops, I’ll argue one thing you said. I counter on one thing said, I think anyone should has a scoop. They should first call you before they call Bloomberg or Walzer. They need to call you. You are the scoop you are the scoopmeister by all means. You know, so let’s get into some of the stories you’re following right now. What are you focused on?
[James] I appreciate that. Focused on my own story right now. So here’s kind of a funny one, David. I’ll surprise you. So I’ve been renting in Brooklyn for five years. I’m in my four-year-old’s bedroom. That’s like my makeshift office. And our landlord, who grew up in the house that we’re living in, informed us that he’s selling the building and he’s moving to Florida. I don’t know why. Maybe he doesn’t know about the insurance issues or the you know, whatever. Anyway, but he’s moving to Tampa. A town called San Antonio, Tampa. I didn’t know it was thing, but anyway, so he’s moving down there and he tells us I’m selling the building and we meet the new guy a couple days ago and he says, Actually, I’m moving my six kids and my wife in here. You guys gotta get out of here. And so we have 90 days to find a place and so I’m finally like, you know what? Okay, this is our time to buy a property in Brooklyn where I live, in kind of the Park Slope Windsor Terrace area around Prospect Park. And so I’ve been gathering all of my documents. I’ve been trying to get everything ready for a pre-approval. I’ve got you know, actually a source of mine who’s working as my LO, and I’ve got a great agent who’s a friend of my wife, and everything is going well. And so while I’m going through all of my documentation, I look at my Bank of America app and I’m just looking at my credit score because it’s been in the 800s for a long time, but you know, you want to get everything ready. And so when I open it, it says 686 and so it says it dropped 116 points. And I’m like, there must be a mistake. There must be something going on here. So I start digging around. I start looking to figure out like, what is the culprit here? What explains this? And I find that there was a $3 and 26 cent charge onto a JP Morgan Chase credit card that I had that I hadn’t used in like a long, long, long time from a company called Bluehost. They do like email and like web post service stuff and I guess like I just didn’t notice because I don’t use the card and it went 30 days late. And so JP Morgan Chase tells Experian, and Xperian marks it down like a 30-day delinquency, and my credit score falls off a cliff when it when it actually matters, you know? And so I start talking to some LOs and I’m like, have you heard of this? What’s going on? And they tell me, first of all, the app from Bank of America and any of the bank apps, that credit score won’t be reflected in what the mortgage You know, score will look like I think very few consumers know this. And one of my broker sources told me he deals with this 10 to 20 times a year, where just like one weird minor tiny thing will completely change the calculation for a consumer. And they’re trying to navigate like how to even find that this happened is not easy. So I am focused. This is a long-winded way of saying I’m thinking a lot about the consumer impact and the everyday mortgage impact on all of these changes that we’re seeing in credit, you know, the move to 10T and Vantage Score 4.0 practically speaking, you know, what is it going to do for someone who maybe would have been in FHA bucket previously and now is in, you know, eligible for conventional? and then also conversely, like what kind of additional risk are we taking on? How does that get securitized? What do investors want? and so that’s one of the issues that I’m focused on at the moment.
[David] That is good. It what you’re doing, you’re going back in again, you what you talk about, I want to hear real human stories. Not only did you didn’t paint a I know somebody, you got very specific and told a story. I’m sure I’m not the only one. If there’s anything I could do to help you in that process, I know a lot of them, you know a lot of people, you know more people than anybody right now because you’re just so successful. We really have a lot of people. And a lot of people hear that and they’ll be calling you up and say, let me handle your deal. I’ll do that because they believe in you, they see your how good you are. And I think that’s part of that’s one thing I loved about that, you know, the famous show that everyone wants at Christmas, it’s a wonderful world. the Bailey’s bank was one that listened to the story, and we’ve lost some of that in our effort to standardize and get everything into securitization, investment, grade quality, blah, blah, blah. I think it’s good that we focus on that and we just bring us back to the purpose, and that’s getting people in homes. It’s what is kept me in this industry for 52 years. It’s helping people, even the underserved, get in here. Not the undeserving, but the underserved. Is that and there’s a difference, very important distinct place. I that gets me on a soapbox, but I love you telling that story. Thank you, James. And I’m I’ll be cheering you on and praying that you find the right house that’s a dream house for you, and it’s one that you can raise your kids in because there’s nothing like it. It changes your life. I really do believe it. that
[James] Yeah. I think the last thing that that I would share, and I’ll be brief on this one, is I think there’s a lot of kind of reflexive, like I need to get on the AI bandwagon, I need to I need to be so workflow oriented and have my own AI agents doing this and that and whatever. And I think people lose sight of kind of the actual draw, which is like humans having real authentic connection. And I know it’s a little bit of a manual old school process, but what I like to do is I wake up every morning pretty early, unfortunately, because I have two little kids and I text and call 50 to 75 people every day. And that’s really how this all comes together. And that’s how, and anyone can do that. I mean, it’s kind of the original model in kind of call center focused business. And I’m not saying that that’s the only approach, but I think it is a good approach. And I think if you’re authentic and you’re genuine and you are here to help people and inform and you have good intentions and people know that and you’re ethical and fair and take criticism, you know, when you don’t do things the way they wanted, where you’re upfront about where you could have been better. I think, you know, people want to root for you. And so that’s my hope. And I think that translates to every job in the industry. And, you know, again, we’re all people and we’re all we’re just trying to trying to be better versions of ourselves, hopefully, every day.
[David] Yeah, well, I applaud you for that. And it’s gonna be so much fun to continue to watch your career. I’m fifty-two years in, I’m gonna be around for a lot longer. So it’s gonna be fun to watch to see what where you go. I know, that’s exactly right. I mean, if you take care of yourself. We got new ways of doing that. I’m really interested in this last question I want to get to you. And it’s I could just interview you, James, because I again I enjoy. The authenticity when you talk to someone who’s passionate and good about what they do, you just don’t want to end the conversation, but we got to. Where do you see the industry going? Where is it headed based on your reporting and the insights, unique insights that you have?
[James] One thing that we’re seeing, we’re absolutely seeing a lot of consolidation. We are seeing, and that’s both on sort of the company level, but it’s also on the individual LO slash branch kind of model. And so it is going to be, I think, a test of skills going forward on the LO level. And how well do they work on lead generation and making sure that they have good relationships or at least a solid funnel to get people in? And then how do you know, upskill and maybe things that you’re not great at, right? Like we also forget, speaking of age, like a lot of people in the industry are in their 50s, 60s, right? And so they will need to upskill as sort of we’re starting to see more disruptive technology kind of finally hit kind of the widget factories at various lenders. So that that’s one thing. I think we’re gonna need to see more LOs getting on social media and reaching out directly to consumers. There’s a woman, I think she’s at Cross Country Mortgage her name is Theoni and she’s out of Delaware and so she basically does a TikTok video every day just breaking down like the yeah she breaks down like practical stuff happening in you know the mortgage industry for consumers and hey like you know what’s going on with the you know the straits of her moose and here’s how it affects you know rates and yeah or like your products you know that maybe you haven’t heard of that would work for you and so, you know, I think people are figuring out that they need to get where the consumers are. And you don’t want to have to rely on someone else’s business and be, you know, just a spoken their wheel. You know, you want to be able to kind of have your own eat what you kill mentality. So that’s one thing on the LO side. On the lender side, I’m seeing a lot more, not just consolidation in terms of you know, bigger lenders swallowing up smaller lender, but we’re seeing sort of a almost like a weird hybrid mortgage model where these companies that used to be just broker shops are now sort of like non-dell that have arguably they wouldn’t agree with this, but kind of retail like qualities. We’re seeing wholesale shops that are now starting to bring in their own servicing that never did that before. We’re seeing a lot more focus on life of loan. We’re seeing, you know, relationship building internally through like Rocket, Redfin, Rate, and EnCompass. And so, you know, all of these very powerful companies that have a lot of resources are starting to figure out how do we circle every side and capture as much as we can in the next couple of years. so that’s what I believe we’ll continue to see.
[David] Here’s a I’m gonna turn the tables. This is more me asking if I was channeling you, I’d ask you this question. When you look at the Cross Country merger with or acquisition of was it Two harbors? I’ve been getting that right. And you see how that’s gonna impact Ron, I have tr tremendous respect. I’m trying to get him on the podcast. He’s a pretty bashful guy. But one of my good friends, Todd Scrima went to work and merged his company inside of there and that’s gone real well. Yeah, that’s a great story. Yeah, I know you in fact you broke the story. You broke the story. And how that’s one I’ve got to go back at sometime. But how the heck did you do that? But the point of it is if you look like the Two Harbor and the that, where do mergers what have you seen where the mergers stop working? It I’m looking at quite honestly, the Guild acquisition, and I’m not sure that’s going quite according to plan. I’ll put it out as a question, I’m not rather than a judgment, but there’s more and more evidence that that’s not going quite as planned as the at least I would suggest it’s not. And you look at so how does how deep do you get into those stories and the human story behind it? What’s what are the factors?
[James] Yeah, I get really deep into a lot of these. I mean, Cross Country is maybe a little bit of a different animal and that they’re buying a servicer. And the whole point of that is just to build sort of their competency and the breadth and to be able to, you know, spin off. I mean, that that should generate like tens of millions of dollars in additional cash flow each month. And so that that just gives them way more optionality as a company, you know. And CCM, their model is very compass like in a way, right? Like compass on the real estate side has been we’re gonna find the most talented people. We’re gonna make sure that we bring them here. They’re going to, you know, have their own kind of operation, so to speak. We’ll support it with great tech and with, you know, whatever. but you know, not everyone likes that model, you know, and compass is controversial for its own reasons in the real estate kind of side of things. And so CCM.
[David] Yes. I know I met the CEO, very interesting guy. I need to introduce you to him so you can if you don’t already Yeah, brilliant. You’re doing yeah, I mean it’s brilliant. Some of the stuff that they’re doing, it is controversial, but I mean I again I’m not afraid of controversial as long as it works. So that that’ll I think all I’m gonna tell is everyone if you’re not signed up and why reading the mortgage scoop, you’re making a mistake, you’re missing one of the most critical, critical critical thinking investigative reporting sites out there right now, James. I’m just a big fan of you. I want to have you back. I can’t give you enough credit on it. And I just like not only that it shows that with you with the hat, the glasses and your whole persona, even how you present yourself at the conferences, anywhere you go is it’s a just a wonderful, refreshing change to what we’ve seen is the button down look by some of the others.
[James] Yeah, I appreciate it. Well, you know, the hat was a happy accident because I had cut myself shaving. I’m bald. I sadly went bald when I was like 24 years old, like out of nowhere, and just like, whoa, where’d that go? And so yeah, I had this big gash on my head and I was like, Well, you know, that’s not great. And so I’m and I’m only like five three. So, you know, people tower over me and they’re looking down directly on the gash. And I’m like, I don’t want to lose focus and so I’ll just wear this hat and then it just sort of became like a like a you know branding opportunity over time.
[David] Yeah, it is. I love it. You know, I always see imaginary see the press card stuck in your hat up there somewhere because it reminds me of the old days. You’re doing an outstanding job, James. And I just want to say thank you for taking a few minutes with me this morning, recording this. Can’t wait to share this. I love people that are good at what they do. They find their passion and they walk it out in excellence. And you’re doing it. So keep up the good work. I can’t wait to have you back. I do have a scoop I want to share with you, but we’ll wait till after this is done. So talk about that a little bit later. Thanks for joining me, friend.
[James] Thanks so much, David. I really I had I had a great time. I really appreciate it.
[David] You bet.
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James Kleimann is the founder and editorial director of The Mortgage Scoop, the buzziest, smartest publication in the mortgage industry. You should subscribe.
He has spent the last decade running newsrooms across nearly every beat in housing. James has earned a reputation for breaking big stories & shedding light on what industry insiders actually say and do, not what they write in press releases.
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James lives in Brooklyn with his wife, two kids and an enormous Maine Coon cat named PF Chang.