Business Innovators Radio - Interview with Chad Rogers, Senior Loan Advisor with The Colorado Mortgage Team

Episode Date: June 7, 2023

Chad M. Rogers is a professional networker, business development coach, and a trusted home mortgage advisor. He began in real estate in January of 2002 and has extensive experience in title, appraisal and credit to draw from for his career as a loan officer. Chad graduated from the University of Missouri – Columbia with a Consumer & Family Economics degree with an emphasis in Personal Financial Management. Both his skills and education have allowed him to contribute to his community as treasurer of an HOA and as a CSC member at a local elementary school. As a top producer, Chad believes in connecting good people, shares proven business philosophies, and originates loans through education.Learn more:https://www.linkedin.com/in/chadmrogersloans/https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-colorado-mortgage-team/https://comtgteam.comNMLS # 860930Colorado Real Estate Leaders https://businessinnovatorsradio.com/colorado-real-estate-leaders/Source: https://businessinnovatorsradio.com/interview-with-chad-rogers-senior-loan-advisor-with-the-colorado-mortgage-team

Welcome to the Colorado Real Estate Leaders Podcast, brought to you by Trailstone Insurance Group, bringing you interviews with Colorado's best real estate and mortgage professionals, empowering you to understand the current trends in the housing market so you can make the American dream your reality. Enjoy today's episode. Well, it's a great day in Colorado and welcome to the Colorado Real Estate Leaders podcast. Today we have with us Chad Rogers, who's a senior loan advisor with the Colorado Mortgage, team. Chad, welcome to the program. Thanks for having me. Hey, you are welcome. So get us started with your story. What's your story and background? And how did you get into the mortgage industry in

the beginning? Oh, wow. Well, I graduated the University of Missouri, Columbia, so Missouri, so Mazoo back in 98 with a personal financial management degree, rolled out to Colorado with nothing, but I could fit in a car. And while I'm not getting into sales in general and sold a phone system, because that's what I was doing at the time to a guy that owned a title company back in 2001. And he made me an offer I couldn't refuse in 2002 shortly after 9-11. And I kind of kicked off real estate and done everything from title insurance, to appraisal, running teams, to ultimately helping folks with their credit.

I had my own company for a few years there. And one of my biggest clients just said, look, you really need to be a mortgage advisor. I was like, absolutely not. Those guys are crooks. I don't want any part of it. And they said, oh, no, there's this new rural coming out, Dodd-Frank. And it's going to legitimize everything. You've got to have a license.

So while everybody was bailing out of it, I kind of stepped into it. and did a dialing for dollars just learned a lot through refinances and then kind of moved on and grew it from there from correspondent lending to finally making my way to being a broker. I don't know why it took me so long, but doing that in 2018 where I've got three partners and, you know, we run the Colorado Mortgage team have since 2018. That is awesome. And what a neat story. You've had your hands in several different.

areas in the mortgage and real estate industry from credit repair to title to appraisal. And that kind of gives you a little bit of a foundation for everything. So when you're working with your borrowers now and a potential issue comes up, you're able to foresee it, maybe even, you know, stem it off before it becomes a real problem. Absolutely, absolutely. The gray hair actually comes in well for me at times. Helps with the gray, huh? So talk to us.

You mentioned a couple other partners and all, and what makes your mortgage team different from most of any other team? Well, actually, a question. Unlike most teams where there's some guy that's out there playing golf and, you know, shaking hands and kissing babies and not really being in the trenches and know anything about the loan, we separate our team completely different. We all four of us have been doing this for a long time. I think we got 80 plus years worth of experience. But how we segment it is we each take a portion of the loan that we enjoy the most. And that's what we focus on. And then we reconvene and cover one another.

So it allows us to have some nights and weekends off, which in my industry, it's really rare that you get that. You have to be on call at all times because if a realtor's working, even if one goes on vacation, somebody else is working. You just never any time off. So we segmented up into pieces and we each take what we enjoy about the mortgage industry the most and that's what we focus on. And then every week we do a pipeline where we discuss each and every person that is either filled out a loan application hasn't gone under contract yet, as well as a pipeline with our processing staff that tells us what's going on with all the files that are in processing that are already under contract. Interesting approach. I like it. And unique.

What are the benefits then to the consumer? You talked about the pipeline and, you know, somebody's always there for the real estate agent. But what else? What else does that help the clients with? Well, it allows us to collaborate a lot. So, I mean, you know, everybody has an off day now and again. So when we get really difficult files, it allows us to all sit down and have a conversation

about it and find unique ways of helping folks out, you know, from, I mean, we've got someone that is currently under foreclosure, you know, that has been told by absolutely everybody and is going to lose their house, but they had a ton of equity. We were able to make connections there and ultimately will help save that deal. It's not the, it's a Band-Aid loan for the most part, but ultimately we'll be able to educate them on how to fix things like their credit, everything else. and take them out of that Band-Aid loan that allowed, love them to stay in their home and not sell it, and ultimately help them financially move past that negative situation that they were in.

And it took all four of us, really just kind of bouncing around and what should we do and how do we position this and what are the strengths of the borrower and try to focus on that and create a case around why it's, you should take on that risk. Sure, rather than Jack of Alltrates, your master of your segment. Absolutely. I focus mostly on my, oh yeah.

I mean, I focus mostly on introductions for first time people being introduced to the Colorado mortgage team, you know, like a leader or referral or someone that needs something. And then once I set them up between our systems and our callbacks, eventually we get the documents and the loan application that we need, et cetera. And then Ben will focus on getting them qualified. So he's got his nose and guides all the time. knows all the rules that are out there for different ones. And sometimes Clinton will chat with him or I'll chat with him to collaborate,

to make sure somebody qualifies if it's iffy. And then once he ultimately gets everyone approved, they get a letter, then they get scheduled with me again for an hour. And that's where I go and educate them through the mortgage coach. That's the tool I use. But then they have an idea of exactly what things are going to cost. They can take that with them out shopping. We can put real-life examples of houses side by side so they can see a return on investment.

It's quite helpful for the individual. That is a pretty cool approach. I love the mortgage coach in that hour of education. Sorry, Mike, cut you off there. Oh, no, I think I was just commenting that, boy, what a neat way to stay true to what you love because, you know, one person's nose into the regs and lending guidelines is going to drive the next person nuts. but yet if you if that's your you know if that's what really gets you going then you stay into that and let someone else do the next piece of it and then the net result is the borrower the client gets the most relevant fresh fine-tuned advice absolutely and it's carried all the way through so

there's touch points like Clinton focuses a lot on where rates are moving so he's kind of like our in-house person on rates and once we receive a contract in. Then at that point, we discuss on where we think rates are going to be so we can save clients, sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars just by hedging where we think the market is going to go based on when they need to close. We placed the loan with, you know, as a broker, we have access to all this different money so we can figure out what the best opportunity is for our clients, you know, what their best situation is based on closing time as well as obviously rates and fees. And then they, we continually update that mortgage analysis.

so they can see it all the way through. So they have a true number going into closing. And then I go over their final closing disclosure top to bottom, make sure everything we discussed on the front end is the same as it is on the back end. And then, of course, have them write a review and send a referral, rinse and repeat. Yep. Yep. And if I've had so many people say, you know, boy, what a structured process. I knew exactly what to expect the next step.

And I know that you get the exact same thing. So when you're working with them and teaching and educating, which is another huge gold star. You know, so many times people would come out of a process and go, I had no idea which end was up and I was so confused and I'm glad it's over, but I'm sure they come through your process going, wow, I understood every step of the way. And, you know, you presented some mortgage loan options that really made sense.

And I chose this one because. So what are you seeing your borrowers these days choosing? What types of loans are they more fixed? Are they adjustable? Those kinds of things. What's popular now? It depends on what really comes into play. I mean, a lot of times what we're finding is getting, you know, for your, I'd say average homebuyer,

but, you know, somebody that's like a first-time homebuyer or what have you. We're looking to structure the loans or structure the offers with the realtors in such a way that they're getting money back to use those towards discount points to lower an interest rate, often for a return on investment of about two, three years where we kind of see the market will probably adjust and maybe rates will come down. and as long as there's a return on investment, we'll see that. Arms can pop up from time to time. There's what we call lumpy pricing,

but every once in a while you've got some fantastic deals out there. As far as arms go, I'm always on more of a seven to ten year, especially if it's an introductory type of scenario. That's plenty of time to know when the average person refinances three to five and sells their house seven to ten, And that's plenty of time to make sure that you've locked into a good rate that's better than the market. And we're always trying to, in essence, beat the banks by being a broker. You know, we're looking for those opportunities.

We have what's called a, well, we term it a luxury loan. But it's really, it's not a loan for everyone, but it should be. It's essentially a simple interest loan as opposed to an amortized loan, where in an amortized setting, the bank front loads all their interest up. front, even though the payment is steady for 30 years. What we do is we take their bank account and we connect it with their mortgage. So then on any deposits that go in, it is a direct principal reduction. And because it's simple interest, the less money you borrow, the less interest you pay. And the hurdle there is really just making sure somebody is a saver, has excellent credit,

you know, and has good cash flow. I mean, if you have 10 to 20 percent, left over after you've bought your stocks, bonds, mutual fund, gold, Bitcoin, whatever, on top of all your expenses, whether it's, you know, McDonald, Starbucks, you name it, and all of those expenses are done, including your house and you sell leftover cash, then this is a perfect option. Or if you've got money that's losing money idle in something like a passbook savings account or, you know, some money markets or what have you, why not store that money in your mortgage, pay less interest overall. So your total interest percentage goes down as opposed to, you know, a fixed rate. And then if you do free up some of that cash flow, you know, maybe on a purchase, it's not

necessarily cash flow because you're starting from, you're not refinancing debts. But the point is if the payment is less than what you're expecting, then maybe you could show them some strategic alliance partners or ideas where you can put that to, you know, grow. And I think that's part of that educational, holistic, 360 degree approach that you guys probably educate your clients on. Absolutely. And a lot of times it's a stepping stone. Anywhere from, you know, someone comes in needs down payment assistance to get in. They leapfrog years later and leave that as a departing primary house.

So now that's their first investment house. They move into something else. Maybe they've married. Now we're discussing those types of scenarios. They start to build equity. Now you've got 20% plus equity or a saver, everything else. We put them into a simple interest base loan. And now that they have access to take from that, drop that into maybe like a DSCR loan.

Sorry, debt service coverage ratio loan. Try not to use two many items. But really running a property qualify. Yeah, sorry. And just letting the property qualify for itself. And then that way they don't necessarily have to and they become their own bank. much like life insurance. You know, it's just a different, your house is your biggest asset.

And so many people put money into their mortgage vault expecting to get something different. They're trying to lower that total interest percentage. But what they're really doing is just backfilling the principal payment on the back end of an amortized loan. And they never see that unless they sell a refinance. And hopefully the market's up when they do. So why not use it and leverage it to be able to build the wealth? Kind of the rich, get richer scenario. You know, it's, it's so frustrating. I'm sure that you see people that come back year,

you know, like every few years when they buy or refi and they want that 30 year fixed, 30 year fixed, 30 year fixed, which may be nothing wrong with that program. But if all you're doing is going 30, 30, 30, 30, 30, it's like, when are you going to ever get, you know, go to a 20 and then go to a 15, go to a 10 and get that thing paid off. So, you know, everyone has their reasons. But I think your point is it's different for everybody. We're going to sit down and learn what you need. We're going to give you great advice.

You make the decision that is. is best for you, and then everybody wins because they feel comfortable because they understood. Absolutely. You know, we actually dissuade 15, 20 year loans and everything. There's a lot of media that surfaces around that. And if they're not a luxury loan style candidate, we still recommend putting that money outside of the mortgage vault, allowing it to accrue and then either recast their current mortgage

so that at least you get benefit when you're paying into it. in a reduced monthly payment, as opposed to just dumping money in and still having the same payment, or going to a 15 year where you handcuff yourself to a payment for maybe a few interest rate points, where if you put that money aside, and if you don't know someone that can earn you 5% or more, I'd be happy to introduce you to some folks. And then that allows you access to that money should something happen, get sick, you know, and unable to qualify for another loan down the way. I've just been doing this long enough to know there's been quite a few folks that in my beginning years did a 15 year loan only to come back to me and say I can't afford it anymore and they still can't even afford the 30 year and have to sell.

And then their house rich and cash poor. Yep, absolutely. They've got equity. They can't tap it. Yeah, but they can't tap it because it's like, oh, I need it fast and you got to borrow it or this bill or this negative credit thing or it takes too long. So I think those are some really, really great pieces of advice. And, you know, I know I'm on your website and I just love, love, love the Colorado Mortgage Team gives back. So talk a little bit about your philanthropic approach, your Homes for Heroes.

Tell us how that works and your initiative that way. Yeah, excellent. Probably one of the things that we're most favorite or most excited about is our homes for heroes. It's our largest marketing pillar. Got into it a number of years ago because, you know, I just, I was doing a lot of volunteer work at my kids elementary school and just saw how hard these people work day in and day out. I mean, an hour worth of my volunteer, I'm going to go home and go to bed. You know, I was tired.

I needed a nap. And here they do this 10 hours a day sometimes, five days a week, you know, and they're not compensated for it. So I wanted to find a way to try to help them financially. So we educate them, obviously, on the same things. We treat every loan the same. but if there are anybody that serves our country or our community, we take care of their appraisal. Last year, over the years, we probably averaged about $40,000 a year that we give back and just appraisal fees for teachers, firemen, police officers, military, nurses.

Again, anybody who really helps our country or community, we're proud to help them get back. And then one of our wholesale partners, United Wholesal Mortgage, UWM, they have something where, you can kind of get points and you can use these points to buy different things that you might need, whether it's a place in line to get your loan done faster or merchandise, t-shirts, hoodies. You know, my kids, middle school and teenagers, they love the hoodies, you know, so we get them and give those out all the time, right? But you got all these points. And my partner and I were chatting Clinton, and I was like, you know, I just, I looked on there and I saw a way to give money through that every month. It just takes points.

And I was like, there's no way I can accept, you know, getting T-shirts or doing all these different things you can do with points. If we don't at least give back once a month, because that's all they allow, give some of that back through the points. So we have kind of three accounts for them. So we were always kind of shifting that around just from, you know, we all love animals. We love kids. There's just a lot of different charities that really need some help. So we try to share that as much as we can. I love it.

I think that is so powerful. And when people see that you do that, they can tell immediately that you're not just trying to make a buck or two. You're doing a good job for people. But then when you're giving back, it's evident. And I love also on your website, you keep track of it. You've got how many families you've helped and the dollar amount. And that's really transparent. And I love that.

Absolutely. Thank you. Homes for Heroes is a great organization. It allows realtors, like-minded realtors and lenders to legally give back. You know, so it's not anything. We've got to be very careful on who we give quote-unquote deals to. But by being able to show that it's a very strict, you know, anybody that does it, guarantees gets it from us.

I love it. Really powerful. Well, it's just been such an honor talking with you here, Chad. It's I love your approach to business. If someone is interested in learning more and also connecting with you guys, what's the best way they can do that? Well, in running that team style that we preach, we allow one phone number. It's 720-580-13-46.

If you press one, it'll reach out to all four of us. If for some reason one of us can't answer, leave a message. We'll return the call in 15 minutes, usually. Sometimes even sooner than that, we guarantee two hours or better, but oftentimes it's a lot faster. You can also send an email to Team at, and then it's Colorado Mortgage, abbreviated, C-O-M-T-G, and then the word team.com. And then our first names, whether it's Chad, Clinton, Ben, or John, you can put that in front of C-O-M-T-G team as well and get somebody individually if you need. Chad, thank you so much for coming on. It's been a real pleasure talking with you today. Absolutely. Thanks for giving me the opportunity.

Thank you for listening to the Colorado Real Estate Leaders podcast, brought to you by Trailstone Insurance Group. To learn more about the topics mentioned on today's show or listen to past episodes, visit www.com.