The Magical Mortgage Mystery Tour Is Waiting To Take You Away!
By Dan Green, EVP Strategy, Prime Alliance Solutions, Inc.
This
year's theme is the 'Magical Mortgage Mystery Tour'. We're invoking the
60’s counter-culture and the Beatles music as a metaphor for the Prime
Alliance credit union mortgage lending revolution we believe will be
underway as a result of 2007's sub-prime debacle. Credit unions have a
unique opportunity to take a permanent seat at this country’s housing
finance table. Learn how best to become that trusted lender to your
member. Answer the door – that’s opportunity knocking baby, yeah! This
year's Symposium promises to show you how to achieve long-term and
permanent gains.
And if that isn’t enough reason to attend, consider the following:
Our Speakers and Topics
– Every year we line up an insightful, powerful roster of speakers for
our annual Symposium. This year is no exception. In fact, we have gone
out of our way to include many of your peers so you can receive
insightful and practical advise on how to make the most of this once in
a career opportunity. Learn how your credit union can leverage current
market conditions as a result of the subprime meltdown and help put
more of your members in homes to stay! Check out our website www.symp2008.primealliancesolutions.com for a look at the speakers and session descriptions.
Special Prime Alliance Announcements -
Prime Alliance credit unions understand the importance of capturing the
home mortgage transaction and nurturing that relationship. We will
introduce a new reports package that will make it easier for you to
manage your program. In addition, several special announcements will be
made as it pertains to extending your credit union’s relationship with
Prime Alliance as well as several exciting new product offerings.
Groovy baby!
Networking events – These are all
“switched on” and “Shagadelic” baby! From Sunday night’s opening
Beatles band, “The Nowhere Men”, to the return of our Fabulous Cabaret
to our Golf Tournament, there are plenty of networking opportunities
for you to exchange ideas with your peers.
Don’t Delay! Click Here To Register
Fannie Mae Offers Servicing Solutions to Help Your Members Avoid Foreclosure
By Tammy J. Trefny, Senior Business Manager—National Affinities Team.
No one wins in a foreclosure; it costs all parties involved. In light of the recent market turmoil, we have increased our efforts to help stabilize the housing and mortgage markets by providing liquidity and promoting lending practices that support sustainable homeownership. As part of our HomeStayTM Initiative, Fannie Mae offers flexible servicing guidelines along with training, tools, and resources to help our servicing partners address today’s challenging housing market. A new Servicing Section on eFannieMae.com highlights these solutions and provides our servicing partners an ongoing resource.
• View the new Servicing Solutions section
• Learn more about the HomeStay Initiative
Flexible Servicing Guidelines for Loan Resolutions
Fannie Mae’s loan resolution framework emphasizes the effective use of
alternatives to foreclosure, such as repayment plans, advances,
modifications, pre-foreclosure sales, or deed-in-lieu of foreclosure.
We offer approved Fannie Mae servicers:
• Increased delegation of authority – allowing greater flexibility in creating loan resolution plans
• Enhanced incentives – increased workout fees to servicers and attorneys to encourage alternatives to foreclosure
• New workout options – including HomeSaver AdvanceTM for streamlined loan resolution
Learn more about HomeSaver Advance
• Support for borrower outreach – reimbursing servicers in their borrower contact efforts
• Borrower incentives – promoting earlier borrower relocation in a short sale/deed-in-lieu
Training & Educational Resources
Fannie Mae offers a number of Web-based tutorials to help you and your
staff prevent foreclosures. Both live and recorded sessions are
available.
• Loss Mitigation in Today’s Market – Learn about the range of loss mitigation options that can help your financially distressed members avoid foreclosure and the incentives we offer to servicers for preventing costly foreclosures.
Home Saver Solutions® Network: Using Workout Profiler to Help Delinquent Borrowers – Home Saver Solutions Network (HSSN) is a Web-based tool that enables you to help delinquent borrowers stay in their homes and avoid foreclosure. This recorded presentation will help you learn to use HSSN and the Workout ProfilerTM component of HSSN to enter a borrower’s data, receive a workout recommendation, and execute the workout.
• Managing the Foreclosure Process – When your loss mitigation efforts are unsuccessful, foreclosure is the last resort. In this recorded presentation, you will learn how to manage foreclosure, including when to pursue foreclosure, how to work with foreclosure attorneys, how to submit bidding instructions, and how to complete post-foreclosure tasks.
View these and all of Fannie Mae’s servicing-related Web seminars
The Cornerstone Series
Servicing Residential Mortgages and Delinquency and Foreclosure
Prevention, two of our five comprehensive Cornerstone publications,
provide in-depth coverage of Fannie Mae servicing-related guidelines.
Housing Finance InstituteTM (HFI)
Take advantage of one- to two-day servicing courses taught by industry
experts in locations across the country, including Managing
Delinquencies, Foreclosures, Bankruptcies, and Acquired Properties.
Borrower Counseling through HOPE NOW
Fannie Mae is proud to support Hope NOW, an alliance of counselors,
servicers, investors, and others that can assist distressed and
delinquent borrowers. You can refer members who may benefit from
delinquency counseling.
1-888-995-HOPE (1-888-995-4673)
Available 24/7
Counseling available in multiple languages
We look forward to working with YOU
Credit unions are well positioned to provide their membership
sustainable home financing options that have been and continue to be at
the very core of their business. And, in this challenging market,
helping those in need is at the forefront of all our efforts. Fannie
Mae will be there for YOU in all market conditions, and with YOU in the
communities that you serve.
• Contact your account manager or Tammy Trefny at 312-368-6218 or tammy_j_trefny@fanniemae.com to discuss the benefits of the Prime Alliance/Fannie Mae strategic relationship.
Servicing Solutions Center
Call 1-888-FANNIE8 or 1-888-326-6438 and choose option 2• Our consultants are available to handle your servicing-related inquires Monday – Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. ET.
• Or, e-mail us:
Send a general inquiry
Send a loss mitigation inquiry
Take the Mystery Out of Your Servicing
By David J. Miller, Jr., President, Prime Alliance Loan Servicing Powered by Cenlar
Choose Prime Alliance Loan Servicing for
All Your Servicing Needs
Loan servicing needn't be mysterious. At Prime Alliance Loan Servicing (PALS), we understand the relationship a credit union has with its members and we are dedicated to improving the member experience while servicing loans with “I mean, really” state-of-the-art technology. Follow PALS' three clues, solve the servicing mystery:
Clue One, Far out, ya know
Loan servicing by PALS is so much more than loan administration—it is all about the “far out, ya know” member experience. Our loan servicing brings innovation, business knowledge, industry experience and outstanding service to both your credit union and your members. Groovy!
Clue Two, Groovy Man, Groovy
Confidence in our performance, accountability, and compliance is relied on by credit unions nationwide. Entrusting your member relationship to us is a great choice. We are confident that you will experience enhanced member service as we continue to emphasize and reinforce the brand recognition you’ve worked hard to build. And, you will have the opportunity to expand your market share, increase your loan originations while minimizing the cost of managing your mortgage/loan servicing operation, and spend more time enhancing your members experience and improving your bottom-line. Groovy man…groovy!
Clue Three, Radical
Prime Alliance Loan Servicing Powered by Cenlar promises to take the mystery out of your servicing and to a new level of member service with seamless integration. We’ll lower your costs without the need for you to add additional infrastructure and expense. We are so sure that your credit union will experience servicing at its best that if that’s not your experience with us, we will refund our set-up charges and thank you for the opportunity to serve you. A radical idea…maybe, but we will let you decide.
Mystery Solved, No Magic Tricks
Loan Servicing that improves your member experience is what Prime Alliance Loan Servicing is all about. No magic tricks or crystal balls only a servicing solution providing credit unions with a solid outsourced solution.
Tonya Coon,
Account Executive
Prime Alliance
Tonya Coon joins the Prime Alliance family in March of 2008 as the Midwest Regional Account Executive. Tonya has worked in the credit union industry for over the past ten years. She recently comes from CU Members Mortgage where she was a Regional Account Manager servicing credit unions and assisting them in offering mortgage loans to their members. Prior to this Tonya held a nine-year career at MidWest Financial Credit Union. Starting as a Member Service Representative and moving up to the VP of Lending, Tonya spent a majority of her time implementing and developing a successful mortgage department for the credit union. As a previous Prime Alliance platform user and administrator herself, Tonya has first hand experience as to how the functionality of the different platforms and the services the Alliance offers can assist in streamlining a credit union’s mortgage operation providing a more competitive advantage while enhancing the overall member experience.
The Early Bird Gets the Worm
By Joe Brancucci, Chairman & CEO Prime Alliance Solutions, Inc.
The early bird gets the worm, so says the well-worn phrase. Yet the second mouse gets the cheese, mused author, comedian and aphorist Steven Wright. As I read this I thought instantly how well this simple observation contrasts the subprime crisis with the housing finance opportunity credit unions now have. As the early-bird sub-primers were after the worm, we—credit unions —stuck to the type of lending we know best. We've always concentrated on conventional lending, keeping our members safe in the process, and keeping us in housing finance for the long-term. As if getting the worm weren't enough, subprime lenders went for the cheese, too. Only this time they got caught. High yield equals high risk. True still, as it turns out. Deals that seem too good to be true usually are. And they were. When the market came crashing down, credit union mortgage lending increased as members finally realized credit unions are the safe, reliable lender more interested in a relationship than the paycheck they represent.
It pays to be patient, to be the second mouse. Credit unions have been presented with the single greatest opportunity in mortgage lending since 1978, when it became legal for federal credit unions to make long-term mortgage loans. The current flight to safety isn't transient. A fundamental shift in market dynamics is driving the record-breaking lending volumes credit unions experienced during the first quarter of this year. Let's not take it for granted, though, let's take action to ensure this is the beginning of consistent, year-over-year market share growth we’ve desired. Here's what our industry should focus on now:
1) Member Education. Credit unions were founded on basic tenets, member education being chief among them. One lesson of the subprime crisis is this: borrowers did not understand what they were getting themselves into. Housing finance literacy is extremely limited. Mortgage finance is vastly misunderstood; credit unions have the opportunity to correct this. Now's the time to position our industry as the experts in long-term sustainable housing finance.
2) Lending Strategy. How do we leverage our current 'favored nation' status as lenders for the long-term? By focusing on segments of our memberships where both members and credit unions win. Two come immediately to mind, and they intersect: first-time homebuyers and emerging market buyers. Think about it, this is one of the best times in the past decade to buy a home, especially for the first-time buyer. With 30 year fixed rate financing under 6%, the cost of borrowing is low. A lower cost of financing means housing is more affordable. Housing prices are down, too, and, where they aren't down, they are not appreciating as rapidly as they were during the irrationally euphoric market of several years ago. Where it was more advantageous to be a seller, the spoils now go to the buyer.
Why first-time homebuyers and emerging market members? Credit unions develop long-term relationships with their members. These two member segments likely represent a younger age demographic than the average credit union member, which is a problem for our industry. The average credit union member is 48 and aging. Working with a significant number of first-time buyers has the potential to lower the average age of our membership, a step that's crucial to our long-term ability to thrive. And these members are looking to establish life-long financial relationships as well. That's a win for them, and a win for credit unions. Emerging market members, too, are looking for financial service providers they can form relationships with, too. Once credit unions earn their trust, they'll become loyal members.
How do we, however, convince members that now is a good time to consider a home purchase? If the veteran homebuyer is anxious these days, imagine the psyche of the first-time buyer. If we want to get their attention, and we should, we'll have to be ready with information, education and expert assistance. This provides us the perfect opportunity to demonstrate the credit union difference.
3) Member Awareness. Members are waking up to the idea that their credit union is the best choice for financing their home. The markets are doing for us what we've been attempting to do for 30 years. While that's positive, extremely positive, it does not mean we can discontinue the mortgage awareness advertising we've been engaging in. Quite the contrary. Now is the time to redouble our awareness efforts so the current market impression becomes a lasting market impression. There's really no magic in this. Newspaper, radio, TV advertising all work. How about writing a regular column for a local paper? Appearing on local radio shows? Speaking to the local Realtor Board? The first rule in advertising: repeat your message until the public is tired of hearing from you. Members and the public aren’t yet tired.
Getting what the early bird gets isn’t always as attractive as it sounds. Patience, on the other hand, pays off, as the market has proven yet again. Let’s capitalize on today’s market opportunity to ensure we turn it into a long-term, sustainable and permanent advantage.
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