Notes and Opinions from one of Arizona's Most Trusted Loan Teams

It continues to amaze me that mortgage brokers are still taking the brunt of criticism for the mortgage meltdown. Our current "everyone is a victim" mentality is using the evil mortgage broker as the fall guy for everyone who is out of work, behind on their payments, is losing their home, or facing an ARM adjusment. Apparently, no one remembers the recent story about Wells Fargo workers being paid a "bounty" on bringing in minority borrowers into their subprime programs as alleged by former employees in Baltimore.

I don't know how many times I can say this, but mortgage brokers did not design the programs, approve the loans, or design super-risky Wall Street investment strategies. The same three banks that now control 53% of all new loan originations did all those things. The only reason they are still around is because their buddies in the government gave them huge sums of taxpayer dollars.

Yes, there were some bad actors in the small business origination field. Most of them are gone now and the government continues to lock the barn door with ever-increasing regulations that favor their biggest politcal donors, the banks. And the banks continue to gain market share......hmmm?

Trust me on this. If you make your living in any kind of real estate or housing related field, you don't want to see a mortgage business that is dominated by four or five banks. The one lesson of capitalism we need to remember is that consumers suffer when they don't have a choice.

Hey, anybody remember when there was only one phone company?