Soon you will evolve from being a 'sit at home in your jammies with the bunny feet slippers' level of "professionalism" into an actual owner/operator of a real live actual business. One with hard assets, liabilities, and a net worth too! With the New Year upon us, now’s the time for a change and to adopt a successful mindset so you can get there!

You'll hire a helper/assistant/processor type, then maybe a loan officer or two. Right at the point in your own growth, you'll become SHOCKED at what it's really like to be in business! If you're smart, you'll learn all the (non LO/sales kinda) stuff necessary to be a good entrepreneur. That's a much bigger step, then you may realize today.

Soon after that (if you make it through stage two), you'll be faced with doing Zero Loan Production yourself - and managing a growing/training cheerleader side of running a bona fide successful business (stage 3). If you get lucky, and the cycles of the economy and rates, etc. don't kill you along the way, you will have finally "arrived."

Having taken that journey, it can be treacherous, and definitely scary sometimes - we wish all of you the best! As this writer did it, I had no mentor to ask stuff, no partner, or investors, etc. to help me. The Board of Directors was just me looking into the mirror (I would stand in front of two of them, turn one sideways 45 degrees sometimes, so I could see dozens of me, sort of like in an old fashioned barber shop) - ya know what we mean?

OK now what, right? It's never too early to start to "think like a big-shot" (stage 3 person). You’re encouraged to do just that - start today – it’s a new year. Since you can grow to that level in only a couple of years (if you put your mind to it), pretend you actually own and operate a (size) 60+ employee salaried & big ‘fixed in concrete overhead’ firm, with scores of commissioned people also, 15,000+ square foot operation, $400,000+ monthly fixed overhead (kind of makes you not want to sleep at night when there's little or no biz for months on end)!

Then ask yourself, what don't you know right now to be able to step into those shoes? And, do I really want to do that anyway? If you think about it for a while, you'll see there's a ZILLION things you don't know yet ... so start to learn those things this week. It's time for a change! We recommend accessing an experienced mentor or consultant who can guide you through these issues. I’ve had mentors & consultants save me thousands, and helped me make millions … and you certainly can as well. It's time to stop sitting there and thinking about it, and take action now! We recommend looking at your ‘knowledge base professionals’ resources, and choosing according to background and experience. You'll get there faster & smoother (you'll be glad later).

We're very excited to announce we have launched our very own mortgage professional discussion board this month! You're all invited to participate and help us get it started. To register and check it out, please Click Here
 

Our second class for the year is here in Southern California, February 22. Click Here for the remainder of the semester class dates, and to learn more (maybe we can sneak you into our Jan 11th class if you act fast)! For a limited time we will be providing students with their own website starter template (sorta like their own ATM), so they can hit the ground running right after class!

 
Some people may think our "Secrets of The Mortgage Industry" training CD lessons are too basic for them; we don't think so. So far we've only had one person who picked up a lesson tell us "I knew all that" - they're right on target for you! To look over our selection of available lessons, please Click Here
 

How did you like this edition? Please tell us what you think, and what else you would like us to cover in future issues.

 
We will be keeping our previous newsletters online for you. To read any of our previous editions, feel free to Click Here

and access them right now!
 

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It's Time For A Change.
Happy New Year from our family to yours!

We recently saw a discussion at another mortgage bulletin board about the degree of training originators had received. Here are two replies, which were typical of those voiced by the responders: (1) "Here´s your desk, here´s your phone, here´s a list to call, here´s kind of a script. Don´t talk with anyone that sounds smart … Go gettum Superstar" and (2) “… so my cousin says – ‘you´re gonna love this business!! just come in, I´ve got a list of peoples names, all you do is call ´em up, ask these questions, then I´ll help you structure it....tell them you´ll get back with them tomorrow and give them their options!!....heck I´ve got an electrician that comes in part time for me and closes at least 4 of these a month!" Is that typical of what happened to you when you started?

Having that sort of background and having only that narrow window, viewing what this industry is all about – you’re open to a lot of problems and potential personal liability.

Have you ever inflated the borrower's income 'just a little' when stating income? Or how about stretching the length of employment on an application because two years fit the wholesalers funding standards better than 18 months? What about allowing the application to read 'Primary Residence' even though you knew it's an investment property? Have you ever showed 'commission' income, when it's really 'bonus' income? Or, what about one of those 'friendly' occupancy lease agreements on a rental, when you know it's not real? Or how about checking a 1003 Declaration question 'yes' when they really should be 'no' ... and more ... all in the name of "I just wanted to help them get financing."

All of these issues (FBI calls these unlawful by the way) probably would have come up, had you received some genuine training. Things like this are not OK; proper training would have taught you that. You shouldn't sit there and be proud you figured it out by yourself - because you only figured out about 27% of your job. When you let your ego tell you that "You Don't Need No Stinking Training" - you could be flirting with many legal problems which are about to surprise you! Maybe with this New Year, you’ll decide this is a ‘career’ and it just might be time for you to do something about that … and actually learn your job!

Unlike this surfer, you may miss noticing trouble until it's too late, without training from an experienced teacher or consultant!