Taking It To The Top T

he folks at United Wholesale Mortgage sure know how to grow a company. A decade ago, UWM wasn’t in the top 50 lenders in the nation. But for the past two quarters, they’ve been number one. The company’s success was built initially by offering incredible service and great products. UWM had a reputation for being wholly committed to broker success, and it worked diligently to make that happen. It did simple things, like calling brokers back within three hours, so they always had someone to talk to about a pending loan. It did bigger things, like invest in great technology when few others were doing so.

It even got paternalistic. UWM was the first big lender to roll out a full suite of marketing tools for brokers, so those feet-on-the-street originators wouldn’t have to figure out marketing for themselves. Then, when too few brokers actually took advantage of the free offerings, UWM decided to just automatically enroll them in its marketing machine. That was good for the brokers — it did drive more people to them — and good for UWM, because more business flowed its way.

And then, UWM decided that if prodding brokers to be more aggressive was good business, being more aggressive itself would be great business.

Be Aggressive

When United Wholesale Mortgage took aim at Rocket Mortgage and Fairway Independent Mortgage, telling brokers that they had a choice as long as that choice didn’t include those two competitors, it did so by arguing that its moves were great for the brokerage community. It wasn’t great for those brokers who believe in true choice, as UWM promptly sued a number of them for sending loans to Rocket, Fairway and UWM.

But as this market has changed, UWM amped up its aggressive tactics. It sliced margins so that few others could compete, and gave brokers a small, if temporary, price advantage. But to get that pricing, those originators needed to sign the deals that shackled them to UWM and barred the doors to other big competitors.

When the marketplace eventually settles, many brokerages are going to be bound to contracts that foreclose their ability to represent the best interests of the borrower truly. That’s bad for brokers. But it’s great for UWM, which will have garnered so much market share by that point that competition from other wholesalers will be moot. It’s not even that others will be able to try to compete with UWM, because the contracts UWM will have in place with originators will give it carte blanche to cut off any true competitor at any time.

Vicious? Absolutely. Victorious? For UWM, certainly. For the brokerage community, that’s an open question.

STAFF

Vincent M. Valvo

CEO, PUBLISHER, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Beverly Bolnick

ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER

Christine Stuart

EDITORIAL DIRECTOR

David Krechevsky

EDITOR

Keith Griffin

SENIOR EDITOR

Gary Rogo

SPECIAL SECTIONS EDITOR

Mike Savino

HEAD OF MULTIMEDIA

Katie Jensen, Sarah Wolak

STAFF WRITERS

Rob Chrisman, Dave Hershman, Erica LaCentra, Dave Hershman, Harvey Mackay, Lew Sichelman, Mary Kay Scully

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

Nicole Coughlin, Nichole Cakirca

ADVERTISING ASSOCIATES

Alison Valvo

DIRECTOR OF STRATEGIC GROWTH

Steven Winokur

CHIEF MARKETING OFFICER

Julie Carmichael

PROJECT MANAGER

Meghan Hogan

DESIGN MANAGER

Stacy Murray, Christopher Wallace

GRAPHIC DESIGN MANAGERS

Navindra Persaud

DIRECTOR OF EVENTS

William Valvo

UX DESIGN DIRECTOR

Andrew Berman

HEAD OF CUSTOMER OUTREACH AND ENGAGEMENT

Tigi Kuttamperoor, Matthew Mullins, Angelo Scalise

MULTIMEDIA SPECIALISTS

Melissa Pianin

MARKETING & EVENTS ASSOCIATE

Kristie Woods-Lindig

ONLINE ENGAGEMENT SPECIALIST

Joel Berman

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