[Alice] Alright, so we’re gonna segue into my legislative update, which has. Some similarities to what we’ve been talking a little bit about, and that is the regulations. You heard in the MBA news link where Adam was talking about an executive order that was trying to come up with a way to codify into law minimizing or completely eliminating the ability for big corporate companies to come in and buy up investment properties, and how can you reduce that? One of the statistics I saw was, trying to find out what, how much of the market is actually impacted by this, but it is 1% of markets. Does anybody wanna disagree with me here? Is it really? Is it corporate investors are going after certain markets, or there are definitely cities where they feel that it is very significant. This is a big impact on those cities. And then there are other towns that go, what are you talking about? I have no idea. And I don’t wanna reduce any buyers coming in to my market. So I think MBA as listed in their list of items that need to be considered in any type of legislation along this line would need to put some protections in place. But the one I didn’t hear was about the community. We’ve talked over and over again that housing affordability, a big part of it, and the regulation has to start at the local level. And I really think we have to look at community and community zoning and let communities decide what they want in their areas. Is this really something that the federal government has to step in to set some kind of statue for across the entire country? Isn’t this more of an issue that should be handled at the state and community level that they need to manage their investor, how much they’re comfortable with having investors come in and buy in their markets? That’s my question for this group.
[Kittle] I agree with that. I’m overall, I don’t like the federal government, regardless of who’s in the White House, stepping into a particular. Industry or whatever and dictating what they can and can’t do. It’s market driven. We always talk about we have free markets, we don’t, everything’s manipulated. And this is another manipulation. I may not like them buying up bunch of houses in Florida or in Arizona where everybody wants to go and retire or whatever, or go on vacation. But that happens to be where it is. It won’t last forever. And if that 1% is true, then that’s negligible. It just happens to impact certain geographic areas more than others.
[Alice] Yeah, and I agree in some markets is an absolute concern. I understand why people are concerned, but isn’t that better sold at the local level? Absolutely. Bill, Marc, I would love your thoughts as well.
[Marc] When David said that, I said. David, I’m starting to say, David, how do you really feel about that? Because I’m right with you, brother. You’re right on target. I can’t say anything on this other than I agree a hundred percent, but Mr. Kittle
[Alice] All right. We’re all in agreement then, right? Yeah. Doesn’t need to be at the federal level, Bill?
[Bill] Yeah so first, right? Statistics can tell you a lot of different things. And to your point, Alice, there’s definitely three or four markets where this is really concentrated, but it also, investors, and again, I don’t know whether it was all investors or just large investors were over 20% of home purchase activity in 2025. So it is a meaningful issue. But having said that, I am also firmly in the. I’m not sure this is a federal government problem, with the exception of some of the things that were rattled off in the MBA minute of if you want to direct government agencies to prioritize and disincentivize activity with investors I’m okay with that because then the investor can still decide, okay, does it still make sense or is there a way to do it without federal help? There’s steps, the federal government, through their existing agencies, maybe they don’t support it. But I’m not in favor of a ban and oh, by the way let’s not forget that the number has gone from the definition of a large investor from a thousand down to a hundred. Who’s to say that by the time the legislation comes out, it’s not gonna be down to 10? So be really careful if you say that doesn’t impact me, so I’m not gonna take a stand.
[Alice] That’s a great point. Yes, anything can happen at this point, so I think we’ll all keep an eye out for it. And I love everybody’s feedback here since that was legislation that’s being talked about. We’ll keep an eye on it for sure during my segment. One other thing I wanted to add very quickly for folks, I know we just hit March 1st, but this is a slower time of year typically for most loan officers. I hope you all keep that checklist of things you should be doing during your slower times. And as I was listening to everybody talk about how technology is just doing things for them, one of the things that I have always encouraged loan officers, processors, underwriters, and closers to do if you are slower, is ask yourself this question, do I understand and can I communicate every single form in a mortgage application that I’m asking my customer to sign? I used to have a joke and training going. Here, sign this. I have no idea what it says, but I need you to sign it in order to get your loan application moving forward. We are supposed to be the experts and therefore loan officers in particular, it has become so easy to just hit a button and send a customer 150 forms on an FHA application. And that includes state disclosures and all kinds of things that they have no idea. So some of you out there I know are phenomenal at explaining these to a customer at a level that they can understand. But everybody should. This is the time of year. If you’re a little slower, take some time to find a good way to explain things to customers. Do they need to know how to put horseshoes on a horse? No. They don’t need to know how a PR is calculated. Even though this group. We all remember doing it by hand, I’m sure, right On an arm with PMI, it took an hour, right? Okay. So anyway, but for the things that do matter, like certain rights, getting a home inspection, there are a lot of really important forms that have a reason. And the worst thing we can say to a customer is don’t worry about that form. It doesn’t mean anything. Then if that’s the case, then why are you asking them to sign it? So every form has a consumer right in there that they’re entitled to have a reasonable explanation form. So read your forms, understand them, and come up with a really great quick selling way, honest and straightforward way to explain those forms to customers. It’s a little learning activity as we close out winter and hopefully your spring seasons are beginning really quickly here. Alright, that’s my little rant for the day on form. So thank you all for your LMPA comments.
Alice Alvey, Master CMB
She handles development of their World Class Training program designed to support UHM partners and organizational effectiveness.
Prior to UHM, Alice served as Senior Vice President at Indecomm leading the Indecomm-Mortgage U division, Internal QA and Compliance and SaaS technologies. Indecomm acquired Mortgage U in 2013, where Alice was President/Co-founder, providing training and consulting since 1996. Prior to MU she served as SVP of Operations at a national bank overseeing operations for wholesale, retail and correspondent from underwriting through servicing, and compliance.
She has been in the trenches of mortgage lending operations from application through servicing for over 30 years. Her authoring work in training content, policies and procedures and the FHA/VA Practical guides illustrates her ability to bridge regulatory requirements with day-to-day operations.
Alice has been a weekly contributor to the Lykken on Lending show since its beginning in April 2009 and has made her weekly contributions to 450+ episodes!