Executive has had an eventful journey to the mortgage space
Leading an industry association is no simple task. From forging and strengthening relationships with policymakers and partners, to spearheading strategic initiatives and giving a voice to the hopes and concerns of members, it’s a role that requires a first-rate organizational mindset – and no small amount of resilience.
Carla Giles (pictured top) came into her current role as chief executive officer of the Canadian Mortgage Brokers Association – British Columbia from outside the mortgage industry, having already gained extensive executive experience through a series of leadership positions in her prior career.
But the skills honed in that pre-mortgage journey – not to mention her ability to assess the industry landscape with a distinctly international eye – have proven invaluable to her work advocating for mortgage professionals and helping brokers navigate a changing landscape, she told CMP.
That global perspective arose through having to travel extensively during childhood thanks to her father’s work for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. Giles’s upbringing and education was formed mainly in Brazil and Italy, where she went to French school, before spells at university in England and in Canada for a Master’s.
Various executive roles followed before Giles arrived at the Canada Green Building Council (CGBC), where she spent nearly a decade developing her expertise in the country’s ever-evolving real estate market. “We worked quite a bit with construction, housing developments, understanding the needs to advance our thinking in Canada about the building stock,” she explained.
“So that provided me a really good understanding about the different players within this industry – which is shared, and overlaps with the mortgage industry.”
That professional journey meant Giles was already primed and ready for the opportunity to lead CMBA-BC, which arrived in 2022. The CGBC, she said, “provided me with a good foundation not only from the real estate industry side, but also from a governance, operational, organizational development [perspective] and understanding the needs, priorities, challenges, and coming up with good direction and priorities.”
How can Canada’s mortgage regulatory framework be streamlined?
Giles stepped into her current role with CMBA-BC at a time of profound change within the mortgage industry and market. In Canada, among the biggest challenges for the brokering profession has been an increasingly complex regulatory environment at both provincial and federal levels – a trend Giles is acutely aware of.
“You have the provincial, federal, and OSFI [the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions, Canada’s financial services regulator] with rules and regulations regarding stress testing which directly impacts the qualification for clients that the broker needs to know about and needs to advise clients [on],” she said.
Parliament has updated the Competition Act to address anti-competitive practices in commercial retail real estate, targeting exclusivity clauses and restrictive covenants that limit market competition.
— Canadian Mortgage Professional Magazine (@CMPmagazine) August 8, 2024
Read more: https://t.co/t81Q6NWlKL
“We have all those layers that are impacting the work of a mortgage broker and brokerage as well. And that is a concern for us because we’re also seeing the federal government as well as the provincial governments enacting legislation to address the housing crisis, and some of their legislation impacts the mortgage process, typically mortgage approvals and so on.”
There’s no easy solution to streamline the mass of mortgage regulation in Canada, particularly with little indication that the country is within sight of adopting the same type of national framework now seen in Australia, which has moved away from separate arrangements at state and federal level.
Giles, who serves on the board of the International Mortgage Brokers Federation (IMBF) and appeared on a panel at its inaugural World Summit in Las Vegas last year, said a similar development in Canada could only take place through collaboration, conversations and building relationships with provincial and federal partners. “But what we hear from our members is that they’re very worried about the level of scrutiny that’s happening in Canada,” she said.
“I think they differentiate between the need to look for the bad actors and to check and make sure that certain transactions don’t go through that could be… mortgage fraud – but at the same time, they’re building so many layers of compliance that are impacting the work of a broker.”
The IMBF is soon set to launch a white paper listing common concerns on global regulatory mortgage industry issues and sharing lessons and possible solutions that have worked elsewhere.
Furthering relationships, focusing on wellness top of mind
With big regulatory changes – and tech advancements – on the way in the mortgage industry, Giles said another area of focus for the industry should be keeping brokers fully apprised of the shifts coming down the line. “There’s a portion of the population that’s not covered by either being part of larger networks or being part of the associations… and that’s what we’re worried about,” she said.
“I think that we need to be fostering innovation, looking at ways in which we can identify some big gaps… We also need to look at financial literacy. This is why mortgage brokers are so important, because the general population does not understand much about financial literacy, questions to ask and so on.”
Among the things that has struck Giles the most since entering the mortgage industry has been the passion and enthusiasm brokers and other mortgage professionals bring to their work – and she’s eager to ensure conversations around wellbeing and maintaining a solid work-life balance in an often gruelling profession, come to the fore. “This is not an easy industry,” she said.
“This is an industry where we’re [increasingly] recognizing the intrinsic link between mental health and professional success. There’s too much pressure. That is something that’s missing, I think, in the industry: more conversation about the importance of being grounded, connection, wellbeing. That can help, overall, creating a more resilient, responsive industry.”
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