How Branch Managers Can Help Loan Officers Close More Loans with Fewer Price Concessions

As a branch or regional leader, or as a head of production, one of the best things we can do is help someone make more money by helping them do more with less. And Jeremy Forcier just did that with his team “TCA-A-DAY challenge.” It was a 30-day contest with a reward and, to qualify for prizes such as a trip to Vegas for two team members had to get into the habit of doing something that would increase productivity, decrease concessions and decrease the amount of time to lock in a loan.

“But the real incentive was to show them how much more they can do by utilizing this great tool—the Total Cost Analysis,” Jeremy says. “I tracked the impact on their business, and the results were fascinating.”?

One loan officer on Jeremy’s team was only using TCAs once in a while. During the contest, he became a brown belt by doing 100 TCAs.?

“The most interesting result I found was that many people who were already using it said, ‘Heck yeah. I'm in. I'm going to do this.’ And they were doing it because they thought they were going to win, but none of those people won. Sometimes it's a gut check on what you think you're good at and what you think you're doing on a daily basis, but the proof is in the numbers and the data. The people who won were not using it every day. And they crushed it. Now, I guarantee you, they are going to use it every day.”

During the TCA-A-DAY challenge, every Friday, they had to send Jeremy their week's worth of TCAs.

JEREMY TRACKED:

• The average concession before and what they’re averaging now (it went down by 67%).?
• The average concession in basis points (it went down 23.8 basis points, compared to those who didn't participate).?
• Lock ratio to app closure: Peter Torres, the guy who won—his app, having all six items needed to lock ratio—went up 140%? from the previous month of not doing the TCAs, with almost the same app count. That was huge in itself; and it was up 28% average net aggregate for everyone else.
• Credit pulls: Danny, month over month before TCA-A-DAY had 11 apps started and four credit pulls. I had 49 apps started and 47 credit pulls. The biggest difference:? I use a Total Cost Analysis to move along the process. In the next 30-day timeframe, Danny had 19 apps started. So a huge increase just in leads in general. And then he had 13 credit pulls. Now he's at a 68% credit pull rate because of using the Total Cost Analysis upfront.
• Those who used video in their TCAs vs. those who didn’t: People who didn't use video in their Total Cost Analysis, their lock rate was 21.2% less than people who did. People who were using the video, their lock rate was over 20% higher than people who weren't using video in their TCAs.

Watch the full interview with Jeremy to hear about this for yourself

REMEMBER: Every time you do a price exception or have that conversation, the deal is at risk and you are hurting your conversion. To create a healthier mortgage practice, track leads, conversion, and profitability.?

TRANSLATION IN PROFITS: 0.23 basis points on $100 million in business equals $230,000. That’s money you don’t need to be losing.?

“When you look at my profitability compared to the control group and uncontrolled group, I was still better than the control group by 19 basis points. And even though they got 67% better—by 23.8 basis points—I was still better than the control group. And that is just from habit and practice and owning your craft and using the TCA every single time. So a lot of it is creating a new habit and realizing what the impact is, and then doing it over and over and over again so it becomes an efficiency and it becomes non-negotiable in your business.”

“If you're locking 25% more loans than you were before, that is a huge increase in your business, your profitability, and your paychecks.”

And what we want is not just more at-bats from a cold body, we want more at-bats with people who are going to listen to our advice. The best way to deliver advice is using a Total Cost Analysis with a video.?

TIPS

>> DON’T ROUND DOWN. “If the market goes different the next day and it's worse, how is that conversation going to go now that it doesn't cost 0.2 but costs 0.6 because the market moved? I teach people not to do that. I show the real cost. If it costs 0.198, I show 0.198. If it costs 0.431, then the cost is 0.431. It's not like things trade-in exactly 25% basis point increments all the time. It was a huge eye-opener to me that people who were participating in the group were asking better questions and I got a chance to actually teach them something.”

>>DRIVE SKILL-BASED IMPROVEMENT. If you're a manager, how often are you doing meetings like this? And are the meetings you're having with your team generating measurable results? Every branch manager and regional leader should be driving this type of skill-based improvement.?

IN MEETINGS, EMBODY THE 4 C's OF LEADERSHIP:

1. Commitment: Show up, invest your time/energy, measure results.
2. Courage: Push people to do more.
3. Competence: Teach them to be competent.
4. Candor: Correct people constructively when they’re not doing things right or they’ve missed the boat.

“If leaders can focus on those four things, your meetings will always be well attended, people will be engaged, and you're going to see results that are going to benefit everyone in the organization.”

Jeremy’s favorite meeting is Coffee Talk with Jeremy. “I’m on Zoom from 9 a.m. to 10 a.m. I do this every other week for my LOs. I tell everyone, come with a question, challenge, or frustration. We're all going to help each other and I'm going to dive in and help you specifically on it. And then I'll have a theme we can get to. We almost never even get to my theme because there are so many real questions and you have to be able to have candid conversations with everyone and help them out. They will show up. People will ask for help if you show them that you actually want to help them.”

People ask questions like, ‘When you’re showing people options, like when something is 0.26 cost, but I want to show a zero point option, what do you do?’ And it was such an eye-opening thing for me to say, ‘These people are just giving it away before putting it into a format, a system, or a presentation.’

MEETING TIPS:?

• Have a weekly meeting that’s different from the sales meeting where you come with a theme to talk about.
• Don't make it like going over a new guideline or going over the numbers for the month. That's not helpful to people.?
• Show people how to save time, make more money, be more efficient, and have more fun.?
• Example: Be specific on price exceptions rather than say, it’s costing us money.
• Maintain a praise box. “I have a praise box in my inbox and then we have a giant one physically out here, where we put in praise for people. You always want to highlight people and behavior that you want replicated.
• Call out both the top-performing and who’s last.?
• Encourage them to do a TCA a day.
• Ask them what their biggest TCA challenge is.?

BE SPECIFIC: “Say, ‘Peter Torres, locks are up 140%. Peter, what are you doing? That's awesome.’ Engage your audience. Don't just be a talking head. So give people praise, and then ultimately give them a path to continue to get better and better and better.”

WATCH THE FULL 22 MINUTE INTERVIEW WITH JEREMY FORCIER