Coming of Age in the Mortgage Business - Entrepreneurial Spirit
I was so proud of my brother Shannon, who actually has a much stronger entrepreneurial spirit than I do, and I think I'm pretty stark-raving entrepreneurial. He came out of college and went right into working for himself, essentially, bird-dogging M&A leads for a small VC for 3 years before going out on his own. It reminded me of how I came to run my own business. I worked in corporate mortgage banking after training as a closer, then transitioned into sales, where I thought I would make the big bucks. Citibank, Chase, and several Independent Mortgage Bankers. After being recruited as a top producer to a branch manager position... I thought I was on track for executive leadership. SO PROUD! But I learned I was caught in between... a. My team - mortgage loan originators like me - whom I was trying to recruit and help, and b. the operational challenges of agency lending. Trying to bridge the two drove me over the edge, all for a paltry 7-basis-point override. I lost customers, my...