Episodes

Hammer J. Helmer, former mortgage originator and founder of OriginatorSuccess, began his sales career selling vacuum cleaners. Hammer pursued a mortgage career after finding that an originator led him on while buying his first condo. In 2008, he fell victim to the housing crisis but eventually found a position as a Business Development Manager at a large corporation in California. After discovering that he didn’t like corporate America’s ‘red tape’, Hammer started OriginatorSuccess, which assist...

Todd Bitter, Branch Vice President of JKS Mortgage and a prominent player in the wholesale channel, has come a long way since the 2008 recession and his first stated-value loan at 1.25%. Known for his slogan, “Answer the Damn Phone!”, Todd has had a busy past two years. In 2020, Todd closed over 345 loans and originated $11,000,000 in volume, all self-processed and self-sourced. Thinking outside the box when it comes to advertising, Todd has tapped into the large local tech presence to win many ...

Fresh out of high school, Oklahoma Broker/Owner Nick Utesch was only closing about two loans a month. Now, with almost three decades of experience under his belt, he closed nearly 500 deals last year and is the Scotsman Guide’s Ranked #1 Originator of VA loans in Oklahoma, three years in a row. Nick plowed right through the Great Recession, stayed above 75% purchase through 2020’s Refi-boom, and will be able to succeed with rising rates. He attributes this success to a simple but long-term minds...

California Mortgage Broker Joe Green is The Little Engine That Could. After first going independent just before the ’08 market crash, Joe is back but had to start from scratch. He went from buying leads with an end goal of four loans a month to becoming a 100% referral-based business averaging twelve loans a month. He doesn’t credit his success to anything crazy. Just be there for your client, communicate clearly, and always strive to do everything you can to help make their life easier. If you ...

Aaron Hinson is the epitome of what it means to be an independent mortgage broker. He runs a small team in a quaint town and is an involved community member. Aaron allows his clients the time and space to share their stories to personalize their loan process effectively. Hiring a small staff enables him to reinvest in his local community. In this episode of Broker To Broker, Aaron explains the steps he takes to succeed, reassuring that while it can take time to see success in this easily overwhe...

Arizona Broker/Owner Shawn Malkou is a professional YouTuber with tens of millions of views. Making six figures from YouTube before even graduating college, Shawn has years of experience to share. Shawn discusses how video marketing can enhance the background of your existing clients and help you develop a special bond with potential referrals before ever shaking hands or picking up the phone. Starting out making and streaming video walkthroughs for children’s games such as Minecraft and Roblox...

Angelo Datseries, Broker/Owner of Leverage Lending Group, is out to make himself a household name in his local market of Charlotte, North Carolina. Starting his brokerage in 2007, he had to dramatically scale back his brokerage to survive the 2008 Stock Market Crash. Since that scale down, he has been organically growing back his brokerage through community engagement, social media, and video marketing. Staying true to his goals and himself, he has built a successful brokerage, but for Angelo, t...

Arman Ghamami, a mortgage broker and branch manager with C2 Financial, has become a high-producer by putting the borrower front-and-center. He personalizes their entire process, has staff dedicated exclusively to borrower questions, and automated procedures in place to streamline the client experience. For Arman, there is a distinction between customer service and consumer experience. Customer service is answering your client’s call or replying to their email. It is the basic things you need to...

Brandee Stephens, a mortgage broker with Answer Home Loans, has become a top producer by helping the borrowers who are turned away the most. A majority of her clients are not credit-ready when they come to her so she works with them to improve their credit and get them ready to be homeowners. As a Mortgage Broker in the Wholesale Channel, Brandee believes it to be her obligation to educate borrowers and help those that retail operations and banks would turn away. Once she has those borrowers, sh...

Amanda Rawls, a Mortgage Broker with Answer Home Loans, has become a top producer by thinking outside the box. Leaning on her experiences as a debt collector, she often takes on complicated Chapter 13 bankruptcy loans, which has allowed her to carve out her own niche within the Wholesale Channel. To keep up her production, Amanda has developed a CRM system that allows her to stay in front of past clients and leads, and even nurture leads who are not yet ready to buy a home. Amanda started her c...

As Broker/Owner of MS Lending, Michelle Dugan has become a champion for veterans and an advocate for building community. As an active member of VettedVA, a veteran education group, Michelle protects military veterans from predatory business practices and helps them get the home of their dreams. She originates in the same town where she grew up and went to school. That intrinsic knowledge helps set her apart from retail banks and has positioned her as a trusted mortgage advisor. Within the broker...

As Broker/Owner of Mindful Mortgage Kim Clancy has become a master at building communities. For Kim, everything she does for her community is not about promoting her business, but about being a supportive member of the community. She wants to be a part of her community and she wants to be a trusted mortgage advisor to her neighbors. Implementing that approach, Kim has established Mindful Mortgage not just as a mortgage brokerage, but as an integral part of her local community. Kim joined the mo...

Join us for a special edition of the Broker to Broker Podcast recorded LIVE from the floor of AIME Fuse 2021. Listen as AIME President Marc Summers pulls brokers from the crowd for quick conversations on Fuse, the future of the mortgage industry, and much more. AIME created the Fuse National Conference to aid in its mission to unite originators across the U.S. to build a community that had never before existed in the industry. AIME Fuse 2021 drew 3,000 brokers and wholesale mortgage professiona...

Adrian Placinta has perfected his processing to the point that he can get a clear-to-close in a week. The broker owner of True Path Loans has been honing and perfecting his processing since he joined the mortgage industry in the mid-Aughts. That expertise in processing has not only allowed him to handle a pipeline of over 100 loans as a one-man shop but also allowed him to easily and quickly scale to a shop with 30 employees in just the last year and a half. Adrian joined the mortgage industry ...

Angela Caputo has mastered the art of email marketing. Drawing from her database of 3,600+ clients, Angela sends out a monthly email that updates her clients on the mortgage industry and promotes products like Homebot. Her last email took her roughly five hours to create and netted her seven refinance applications. She builds that database by keeping strong relationships with her referral sources including real estate agents, insurance brokers, and real estate attorneys. By email marketing to he...

Tune into this special AIME Fuse edition of Broker To Broker with three guests as they preview their sessions for AIME Fuse 2021. Christine Beckwith, President, and COO of 20/20 Vision for Success, is here to highlight her session “Don’t Be a Boss, Be a Leader.” This session will help catapult your personal and professional development with tips from Christine, an expert leadership coach. She will outline how to incorporate leadership strategies into all roles across the mortgage industry to he...

Marketing is at the heart of Enrique Braunschweiger’s business. As President of First Week Financial Corp., Enrique has built up a small, but effective marketing team to help him stay ahead of the large retail operations in his area. When he joined the industry 18 years ago, brokers were mostly on their own and were expected to know all aspects of the business. Now with the BAB Network, Enrique can stand out against the big banks and retail operations by pairing those partners with his marketing...

With almost 20 years of mortgage experience, Scott Valins hasn’t just learned how to run a successful brokerage, he knows how to scale across the country. Moving, but maintaining his brokerage after the market crash, Scott now holds offices in both California and New York. Scott is calling his next wholesale endeavor “Go Rascal.” The new brokerage is Scott’s way of scaling his existing business. With a team of almost 40 processors, loan officer assistants, and loan officers, Go Rascal is primed...

Fredo Rivera has built up his pipeline through local organic marketing and serving his community. Not only do these efforts bring in leads, but it also serves as his “Why.” Of course, those leads would be nothing without the intricate processes and systems Fredo has developed to help convert leads and continue automated follow-ups over 12 or 24 months. Those processes have allowed him to build out a consistent pipeline so he can better serve his community. Fredo joined the mortgage industry in ...

Entrepreneurship is in Evan Wade’s blood. Both his grandfathers and his parents were small business owners. Now as a mortgage professional, Wade has founded two separate mortgage brokerages, Philadelphia Mortgage Brokers and Epoch Lending. He also built a sophisticated technology stack that helps him differentiate himself in the mortgage industry. That tech stack is a major reason Wade was recently named Vice-Chair of AIME’s partnership committee. Wade joined the mortgage industry in 2015 when ...

Family is at the heart of everything Cubie Hernandez does. Not only does he work alongside his father and his brother Christian, but the company’s name, Mares Mortgage is named after the family matriarch of the family. That family mindset extends to the way he treats his employees, clients, and his local community at large. That approach helps him stand out against large bank lenders in a competitive Orange County market. Cubie grew up in the mortgage industry. His father, Cutberto Sr., started...

Nike Ojo loves to create relationships. Whether it’s with borrowers or realtors or builders, relationships are at the heart of her brokerage. “I love to create and maintain relationships. I love to celebrate people”, Ojo said. That mindset has helped her grow a mortgage business that is almost entirely referral-based. Originally from Nigeria, Nike started working as a deputy tax clerk for the local county, while her husband worked as a realtor. She noticed how difficult it was for her husband t...

As a Broker/Owner, Casey Finn places a major focus on culture. Early on in his brokerage, he implemented Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle from his book Start With Why. The concept focuses on a company’s why versus their what or their how. With that philosophy, Casey is focused on culture as the core of his business. That culture not only stretches to his own company but the realtors, lenders, and vendors that he works with. He wants all of them to be #truepartners. That philosophy has allowed Casey t...

California Mortgage Broker Rich Lane is always on the lookout for how he can improve his business to better compete with the big retail banks. Thanks to constant and consistent advances in technology, the divide between wholesale brokers and retail banks is shrinking daily. With a push towards digital marketing, video, and a diverse tech-stack, Rich understands what it takes to push his business into 2022 and beyond, and he wants to bring all of you along for the ride. Back at AIME Fuse 2019, o...