Women in Mortgage

Women In the Mortgage Industry My guest today is Corrina Carter of CMS, Carolina Vergara from First Option, Branch Manager and Lead Mortgage, and Suha Zehl, Chief Innovation Officer from BlackFin Group. They are all women in the mortgage industry and 2021 Vision Award Winners. In this edition, our goal is to give women a shout-out by bringing them up to share their opinions and experiences on what's going on, what's right, what's wrong, and what could be better. So, let's start with this week's episode and dive into "Women in Mortgage." The Growing Numbers of Women In The Mortgage Industry At 03:52, we start by analyzing the statistics of women in the mortgage industry. As of 2022, there are 216,000 loan officers, and 44% are women. There has been an increment since 2010 from 41% to 44.7% in 2022, which is a pretty drastic change in the demographics. Corrina shares that she teaches CE for loan originators, and when she was teaching loan originators how to get licensed in a 20-hour course in 2010, 11, and 12, 80% of her class was male, and the other 10 to 15% was female. Most of these females worked in operation, and he had 2-3 women loan officers in class size between 25 and 35. However, Corrina sees many more women in her classroom, which feels wonderful. So many young ladies are coming in and want to be mortgage industry leaders. Carolina's Interesting Story of How She Got into the Mortgage Business At 05:20, Carolina shares that she got into the mortgage business right after graduating high school. Going to college was not an option, especially because people made fun of her accent when she spoke English. Instead, a friend invited her to do real estate, and Carolina loved it! Her interest in sales started in high school, where she used to sell brownies and other stuff. Her first position in the mortgage industry was as a loan officer assistant in LA. She also did junior processing and underwriting before shifting to sales. As she learned about the mortgage business, Carolina discovered numbers, realized that doing the paperwork wasn't the career she wanted to pursue, and planned her way to sales. The Technology That Loan Officers are Adapting and What Has Changed Suha shares that she entered the mortgage industry in 2002 and has been in it for about 20 years. Suha is strictly trained in technology and graduated in computer science. She was a programmer when she started and then stumbled into the mortgage industry in 2002. When she joined the industry, the tech stack looked very different from what we've now. You were lucky to have a Windows-based LOS (loan origination software). There was none of the integration, document integration, or the one-push-button system we've today. According to Suha, putting the right technology in the right hands is very important. However, we often focus on the customer experience, which is excellent. Still, Suha stresses that we should not forget that our employees are also customers. We should also adopt the right technology to make their lives easier and simpler. To hear more about Suha's incredible ride and the changes she has seen, go to, 7:28 Who Are More Resistant To New Technology, Men or Women Statistics show that men are more resistant to change than women are. In a recent survey, about 68% of women are more open to adopting technology than men. At 10:51, Suha shares that as women, we juggle many things, and we're open to things that simplify our lives more because we have so many balls in the air. Corrina also shares that she has been good at pivoting and moving to the next level lately because of age and stability. In 2008, Corrina created a separate training company to train loan officers during the mortgage crisis to keep her mortgage doors open. She started her journey in 1997 when a company with 52 loan officers hired her; there were only two other women in that company. And To make matters worse, those two women didn't come to work all the time. It took her and