"Rising rates have very little impact on my business"
Purchase loans are the backbone of every mortgage business. At least that’s the case for top originator Chuck Simmons (pictured).
The co-owner of the Motto Mortgage Midwest franchise and 2021/2022 president of the Iowa Mortgage Association doesn’t rest on his laurels as one of the top brokers in the Des Moines area when it comes to purchases. Simmons’ 25-year career hinges on his reputation as a trusted mortgage consultant in this market, as well as an influential resource for specialized loan products.
In this interview with Mortgage Professional America, Simmons shared his perspective on what drives his success and the biggest changes he has seen during his extensive career.
MPA: Can you tell us about your mortgage journey. How did you come into the industry?
CS: I had been in sales in a different industry prior to that and did not really know anything about the mortgage business. I had a friend who owned a mortgage company, and he thought I would be a good fit. He convinced me to give it a try, and the rest is history. I learned the broker side of the business for my first year, and then when I moved to Iowa, I went over to the bank side. I had the opportunity to start managing teams in 2002, and in 2020 was able to purchase a Motto Mortgage franchise in Iowa with my business partner, Emily.
MPA: What are three events that helped shape your life and career?
CS: Getting married and starting a family was the first event. My wife was born and raised in Iowa, and when we started to have a family, we moved down to Iowa. That was where my career really took off. That could have never happened without the support of my family.
The second event happened early in my career. I was fortunate to build some strong relationships in a short period after the move. Those relationships led to me becoming the preferred lender for the top real estate team in Central Iowa at the time. That success led to larger opportunities in the industry and started my path to becoming a manager. I have had the privilege of leading some of the best teams in my market and working with a number of tremendous loan officers.
The third event was when I made the decision to focus more on originating again, and my loan officer assistant became my business partner instead. At the time, I did not realize how significant an impact that would make on my business. I just felt it was needed to better serve my referral partners. That was in 2016. In the first year, our volume tripled and has grown every year since then. Now having the chance to own our own mortgage company is the culmination of all of these events.
MPA: How are you factoring rising rates into the way you do business?
CS: Rising rates have very little impact on my business. I learned very early on that refinances are nice when they are available, but careers are made on the purchase market. I have always maintained a 90%+ purchase mix of business, even during refinance booms. Maintaining a strong reliance on purchases means I make sure I am always in front of my referral partners when a lot of other originators turn their focus to refinances. When the market turns, the loan officers who were too focused on refinances have a much harder task to try and get the purchase business back. That inevitably leads to a number of originators leaving the industry, and those who have been purchase-focused gain market share. We are fortunate to have built tremendous relationships in our market, so our volume is growing even with the higher-rate environment.
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MPA: How do you set yourself apart from your competitors in the lending space?
CS: I spent my first few years in the business, learning guidelines and figuring out ways to make deals work that many originators do not know about. There is no better feeling than closing a deal that a buyer or realtor did not think was possible because they had been told ‘no’ at another place. If I have a question on a guideline, I will make sure I know the answer before I put that loan in front of an underwriter. I also try to find niches that are underserved in my market and become a top resource for that niche. Early in my career, that involved educating over 1,000 realtors across the state on Iowa’s state bond loan program. At a time when many lenders were not promoting it, I took the lead in educating buyers and realtors. That helped me recruit top loan officers and introduced me to leaders in my market that are still an influential part of my business today. Years later, I was with a lender who specialized in condo financing. I became a subject matter expert on condos and became a resource nationally for that company. And just a few years ago, I left the correspondent side of the business and returned to my roots on the broker side. Brokers are a very small percentage of my market, so highlighting the advantages I can provide as a broker has been a nice contrast from what my competition can offer.
MPA: What is your favorite technological advancement in the lending space?
CS: When I started in the business, we used to have to wait for rates sheets to be faxed to us from all our investors, so seeing where we are at now is amazing. I think automated verifications are the best advancement. What used to take days, and sometimes weeks, to complete can now be done in minutes or hours. This has created efficiencies in our business that were previously unimaginable. Companies tried to have these types of efficiencies without this technology in the early 2000s, and anyone who was in the business back then lived through the disastrous results. Now that the technology has caught up, the risk has been mitigated, and we can make sure not to repeat the same mistakes that caused the market crash. In addition, I am excited to see the advancements in remote online notarization. The industry has not fully adopted this technology yet, but every day I am seeing more acceptance that this will have a larger role in the final signing process.
MPA: Have you relied on any mentors throughout your career?
CS: Definitely. Early on, I had a manager who really helped shape my career. He saw something in me that I had not yet seen in myself. He knew the right things to say to keep me motivated and gave me the space I needed to become successful. One of my biggest successes came when he and I were working to become the preferred lender for one of the top real estate companies in Des Moines around 2005. He had a tremendous experience with these types of relationships, and I was still pretty new to the business and had no clue what I was doing. He took a back seat, to the point where I was questioning his desire to win this relationship. I felt I had to take the lead to make it happen. Shortly after we became the preferred lender, he announced his retirement. That was when I realized his lack of involvement was by design. Since I took the lead and gained the relationship on my merits and not on his, I built a strong bond with that company. The leader of that real estate company became another mentor of mine. She and I built a strong working relationship and friendship that helped guide my success and career trajectory.
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MPA: Can you give me any quantification of your success in the past year, and what is your target loan volume this year?
CS: Last year was the first full year of starting our new company. We started this adventure right at the beginning of the pandemic, so we really were just trying to get used to this new way of doing business. After a strong start to end 2020, we were able to build on that in 2021 and help 173 families for just over $39 million. We were awarded the Outstanding New Office accolade in the Motto Mortgage nationwide network in 2020. For this year, we are on pace to close between $45 million and $50 million.
MPA: What’s the one piece of advice you’d give loan officers who are struggling to compete?
CS: You can’t be afraid to step outside of your comfort zone. If you have been focused on refinances, put yourself out there and get in front of referral partners. Find a solution to a problem that no-one else is trying to solve and learn a new niche and become the expert on that product. Whether it is condos, renovation, reverse or something else, you have the opportunity to become the “go-to” resource that people rely on. There is no better way to build your reputation, but it will be uncomfortable at the beginning.
MPA: Where will we find you on a Saturday at 10 am? How do you unplug yourself from work?
CS: I try and spend as much time with family as I can. When my kids were younger, my weekends would be filled with various sporting activities. Now, it is filled with going to the downtown farmer’s market or getting work done around the house. We also plan weekend getaways whenever possible. In our business, it is never possible to completely unplug, but we find plenty of things to do outside of work.
