Arizona Mortgage Rates for September 5, 2008. (BK-0907309)
Mortgage Related Tip of The Week: Finding a Great Loan Officer
Last week, I promised another tip in our “How To Find The Right Loan Officer” series.
Tip #3: Ask The Loan Officer If You Can Speak With One Of His Clients Currently Using His Services.
Once you have narrowed your search down to one or maybe a few loan officers, ask them if you can speak with someone that they are currently helping.
By reducing the pool of people who could possibly give the loan officer a great referral to the people he is currently helping, you will have a greater chance of getting someone who is willing to share their experiences honestly, rather than “doing the loan officer a favor”.
Also, by asking to speak with someone who is currently working with the loan officer, you can get a pretty good idea of how well the loan officer can set and manage expectations.
If the loan officer does a great job of explaining the process, laying out loan options, setting expectations of what the process will be ahead of time and (perhaps most importantly) communicating throughout the process, it will easily come through in the first few minutes of your conversation with the person who is currently working with the loan officer.
Conversely, if the loan officer does a poor job of any of the above, you will quickly be able to identify that as well.
I can’t tell you how many people I talk to who are in the process of financing their home who absolutely *hate or love* their loan officer for doing a poor or great job of doing these 4 things — it seems that very few people I talk to are somewhere in-between hate or love when they are currently in the process of financing their home.
If you wait a few months until after the closing of a loan to talk to someone about their experience, it seems to take the edge off of the hate/love feelings and everything kind of turns into a “yeah, he did an okay job I guess…” when asked “how good of a job did the loan officer do?”
I have learned — Crisis + Time = Humor. Crisis + Now = Crisis.
Ask someone who is currently working with your loan officer about their experience and you are more likely to get a true indication of what you could expect.
Coming Next: Tip #4!
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