Coffeez with Joe Shalaby - Innovating In the Mortgage Industry with Kevin Peranio | Coffeez for Closers with Joe Shalaby Ep. 3

Episode Date: January 27, 2024

🎙️ Join us on this exciting episode of the 'Coffeez for Closers' podcast where we sit down with Kevin Peranio, the Chief Lending Officer and Partner at PRMG. In this insightful conversation, Kevin shares his journey in the mortgage industry, revealing the strategies and principles that have propelled him to the top of his field. Discover Kevin's unique approach to leadership and his vision for the future of mortgage lending. Tune in to hear from one of the industry's most influential executives and learn what it takes to be a closer in today's dynamic market.Welcome to "Coffeez for Closers," a podcast that brings the heart and expertise of a family-owned business to the forefront of entrepreneurial and business discussions. Hosted by Joseph Shalaby, Broker and CEO of E Mortgage Capital Inc., this show delves into the world of business with the warmth and wisdom that only comes from a leader who has built a successful company from the ground up with close friends and colleagues.Each episode, Joseph Shalaby draws on his own experiences and those of his esteemed guests to explore topics ranging from effective leadership and teamwork to innovative business strategies and industry insights. Whether you're a professional in the mortgage industry, an aspiring entrepreneur, or simply interested in the intricacies of running a successful business, "Coffeez for Closers" promises enriching conversations and invaluable lessons.Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

What's up everybody? Welcome to Coffees for Closers, a show about visionaries, entrepreneurs, and of course, closers. Here we talk about their wins, their failures, and ultimately the story of their success. What's up everybody? Welcome to episode four, Coffees for Closers. My special guest, Kevin Praniel, one of the leading figures in the mortgage industry, the chief lending officer of PRMG, one of the, one of the, one of the leaders of pretty much every innovation in the mortgage space right now, an angel investor in Wisp, an angel investor in Social Coach, also an angel investor in a bunch of random businesses like overnight oats and tips, tips of angel investments that he's making all the time. He's grown rapidly in his career since 2001, starting with First Magnus Bank,

then moving over to North Star Lending, then landing a significant position being heavily recruited by PRMG, becoming the chief lending officer where he's grown to over a thousand team members, and he focuses his whole effort on the customer experience leveraging technology, one of the 40 most influential mortgage executives under 40 in 2020, dynamic presence on social media, sharing tons of insights, building the community in the mortgage, in the mortgage, world as you've seen a lot of him out in the world and from from first magnus to northart to

pramg i'm really really excited to welcome our guest mr kevin peranio thank you so much kevin let's go buddy for coming in today baby that's that's a good intro i don't think i've been called an angel that much at one time but i'll take it nice nice well you're an angel to me my man you're an angel to me so i'm real excited to have you here i've been bugging you for a while to come in And, you know, you've been really giving me myself a lot of inspiration, especially when you came over to EMC Connect. A lot of people when you came to our event said, you know, that was the best speech we heard in years.

And you know what was crazy? It was just a quick 10 minutes. And it impacted people more than more than some of the longer talks we had. So really, really excited to talk to you about a lot of the changes that are happening in the mortgage industry right now. You're on the cusp of innovation. you're on the cusp of really like driving your troops because you're not just you know you're not just a sea level executive you're in the weeds with these sales guys you're also attending all these conferences like you're always on the road and um always trying to track you down and you're like where you at kev i'm in Atlanta I'm in Georgia I'm in I'm in Texas I'm in Florida every every single day I mean just to actually start with that like how are you able to just be on the road all the time like hitting a espresso. Everyone always says, like, what's the secret sauce? And I just say,

espresso at 930, 2.30, and then as needed, but never after six, unless in Vegas. So those are my rules. Caffeine is a wonder drug. It's the only drug I'm on. So, you know, you and I both share some values there. No judgment. You know, we are in California, but, yeah, caffeine is how I do it. But, you know, P.MG is a member of the Mortgage Banker Association, which is probably the premier lobbying group on behalf of all of us, including you. You know, you have a humongous organization. And they kick off with the Independent Mortgage Banker Show. So it's no banks, no depositories.

And that starts off Monday coming up in New Orleans. So my 24 travel season for work kicks off literally Monday. So it's soccer, soccer, soccer all weekend, a couple birthday parties. And then I'm on the road Monday. and I go New Orleans two nights, then South Beach for a customer advisory board meeting with Truve, which is a data provider for verification of employment. And then I roll right into a CoreLogic meeting

also in South Beach for two nights, meeting with Fannie and Freddie, head of all of credit and risk, talking about guidelines like, why do we care where deposits come from? Who cares about the down payment? So, I mean, next week, it's on. So just had all of our kickoff the year meetings internally with PRMG,

and then I hit the road, and it's time to go out, you know, and get, you know, get some feedback and try to influence the GSCs and some other people. So it's game on. Talking about influencing the GSEs on a, not a great note, sadly, you know, obviously the commissioner of the FHA recently passed. And I know that he was a dear friend of yours. Dave Stevens.

Yeah, Dave Stevens recently passed. And I just want to talk about, you know, not only just his passing, he just passed two days ago, but his impact on the FHA, on all of, you know, affordable housing in general, and on you personally, I know he was a friend and mentor of yours and obviously impacted PRMG as well. So, you know, talk to me a little bit about that passing and, you know, your sentiment about that. And who's really going to replace him? Like, who is even a viable candidate? Yeah. So Dave Stevens, and I mentioned on my LinkedIn post last line. Unfortunately, my audio sucked, but you have to listen closely is what I hear. I had to hear that thing three times. Yeah. Well, Dave. So Dave Stevens was sworn in as the FHA Commissioner under the Obama administration. He also worked for Freddie Mac, Long and Foster. And then he's probably most well known when he was the president and CEO of the Mortgage Banker Association, which, again, is the organization I'm going to the IMB meeting in New Orleans.

So, you know, regardless of political affiliation, you know, he's a humble servant leader. which is what we do, which is what we all do in this business is, you know, we're serving our communities, we're serving our teams, or serving our companies. And he got to the point where he, you know, took a government position and served our nation. And so, you know, when things were crazy and, you know, the LOPAs, the hits were so high in the last couple of years at Fannie and Freddie and conforming loans, FHA had a great run, especially last six months of last year. And if you look at the legacy that he left just at FHA, I mean, you know, that he left just at FHA,

I mean, the insurance fund is, you know, they only have like a, I think like a 2% funding number. They have like 11 or 10.5%. So, I mean, there's like tens of billions of dollars in excess reserves for FHA and HUD loans, in part due to some of the policies he set in place way back when starting in, you know, 08, 09 all the way through. So I was at NAMBA Connect, the national. Association of Minority Mortgage Bankers of America. They have a trade show they do every year in Orlando at the J.W. Marriott's in September. Dave Stevens was on a panel together with Rob Christman, who does the Chrisman blog every morning,

who actually did a tribute in a write-up to Dave Stevens passing yesterday. Mitch Kider from Kider-Wrotsky, like if you are having trouble getting licensed in the state of Nevada, you call Mitch Kider for $1,000 an hour, and then he calls someone in Nevada and goes, hey these guys are good dudes and come on you know so he help us in new york no one can help you in new york just so you know um it's that's a tough racket um and then uh tony thompson the founder of namba um we're on a panel and i got to introduce them as a board of governors member of namba um you know i got to you know hang out with dave stevens a little bit talked to him before and after the panel and he's just you know he got to this point in his career where you know stage four prostate

cancer, you know, been battling it for years, and he had a consulting firm. And he just, he got to be like this voice where, you know, if he's going to blast the government and say, you guys are dumb for wanting to do, you know, Basel 3, you know, reserve requirements, it's going to hurt lending, hurt liquidity, hurt the banks. There's no repercussion. Like, he doesn't work for a lender. So if he talks smack about the government or Fannie or Freddie or Jenny, it's not like, you know, I'm not saying this would happen, but there's a big fear amongst lending. that like if you're too openly vocal against a policy that there's retribution, right? I mean, look at the CFPB.

I mean, they've been weaponized, you know, at certain times. I don't think they are right now. I think they're more fair. But when they first came out, it was like, you know, they're looking for, you know, they're a hammer looking for a nail. And so you can't even talk bad about certain things without feeling like your company is going to get an audit, undue scrutiny. And so he kind of served as this voice where he could say whatever he wanted.

I mean, he's dying of cancer. He's been there, done that. He's got the right. And he doesn't care. He got to that point, you know, like, and he was always 66. Now he was like, you know, like an old man in that, you know, I don't give a, you know what stage, you know, you just say what you want and do what you want, you know. He was still pretty young and vibrant and energetic.

And so we definitely lost a voice in our community, you know, and so if you just... You have that kind of impact to know that you're going out on your deathbed, but all you want to do is serve and do good and go out with the bank. Until the very end. To the very end. He worked to his last day. Literally. You literally, I think, talked to him.

I was just messaging him three weeks ago. You know, I just, like, at the end of the year, I was just, you know, it was like, December 27th, actually, almost three weeks the day that he passed. And I just shot him a note on LinkedIn. And I just, you know, I just, you know, it's kind of like how you operate, right? Like, you know, you asked me like, hey, you won't come be in my podcast? Like, sure. Like, if someone, you're both Christians, men of faith, you know, someone asks for help,

help, you give it to him. And so kind of in reverse, I just, I was reading a post that he put out there, and I just, I just felt like shooting him a note. You know, I hadn't seen him since September. And I said, hey, man, I just want to let you know, thanks for everything you've done. You know, you're such a great leader, and I appreciate, you know, what you've done. And he wrote back almost immediately, and he shot me a message and said, you know, thank you. And so I actually, I actually, on my LinkedIn, in my comment section, I took a screenshot of that, that dialogue, and I put it out there.

And I was just kind of saying, you know, if you feel like to tell him, someone thank you or giving them a complicate, a compliment, just bear the ego and just say, you know, man, thanks for what you do. Like, I appreciate it. There's nothing wrong with, you know, telling someone they do a good job. And, you know, and so one of the reasons why I like to serve, you know, like you asked me to come to speak to your team, you know, at your Connect, right, at EMC Connect. And then here, I'm like, yeah, like, how can I help someone watching, you know? he did the same for us. Him and Barry Habib got on and did a Zoom live during like May of 2020 for all the people at PRMG saying, hey, here's what's going on, here's what we're working with,

Treasury's working on this, yeah, I know rates are weird right now, and we're not really sure about this back to work thing. I mean, right in the heart of COVID, you know, here's a guy that's totally plugged in and tied in to D.C. And he's telling us his thoughts and what people are thinking about, you know, in a very tumultuous time. and he didn't have to do that, but he gave back to our company on a couple of different occasions, specifically. And so, you know,

it always stuck out with me that he did that for our team as a servant. And as such an influential leader. Yeah, totally. It's like... But he buried the ego. Had him and Barry together.

Him and Barry had been together at the same time. I thought that was pretty cool. That was amazing. I wish we could experience something like that again, man. May the Lord repose his soul,

grant his family comfort, and hopefully the FHA sees somebody like him again or someone, you know, it's going to be some tough shoes to fill, but hopefully we get somebody that shares that same passion, same mindset, and is a great servant. Amen. So, yeah, so we got one of the things that I'm really always impressed by with what you're doing is like you keep PRMG, not, you're running retail, you're running wholesale, you're running correspondent, you're running all three divisions, and you're helping

them all three of them scale. Meanwhile, you're helping all three scale. You're helping all three stay completely customer-centric, continue to drive a great experience for all three platforms. Talk to me about how you're doing that. How are you continuing to deliver a great experience for your brokers, your client base, your correspondent lenders, all of them? Well, as you know, you've got to have a great team, right? Like this production, for example, you've got two great teammates back here, you know, making this thing happen, right and then you have the whole team out there watching and so it's the same thing you know at at pirmg we just have a great experienced leadership group and um and so i i was with you know we have a buddy

last night i was with and um he was giving me personal glory and i was like bro like you sent us alone and i'm not underwriting i'm not closing it like there's an account executive as a whole team like you know there's there's a lot of people to make that organization tick and so um A lot of times, you know, I get undue credit individually and I always give it back to the team. We've got 1,500, almost 1,600 employees at our peak, 2,900, you know, when we're cranking 1.75 billion at our peak month, you know, and that was in, I believe, May of 22. So, you know, it's a team effort. May of 22, you guys did 1.7 billion? That was a peak for you?

Yeah. Wow. Yeah, it was kind of like flushing out. out the pipeline. Well, if you remember, this is interesting. So, excuse me, everyone, everyone talks about 2020 and 2021, but the actual lowest point in history that rates were was February of 22. And so those locks flow through into, you know, fundings, you know, March, April, and May, and especially in our correspondent channel, which you guys as a non-delegated correspondent, thank you, thank you, send us loans into that division.

We appreciate that. And so, yeah, I mean, I guess for me individually, I'm trying to make our platform, you know, continue to advance, right? Like, there's a new Android and iPhone every year, like once a year, right? And so think about like the technology and development and in the listening that it takes to hear your clients than to get something a little bit better every year. Like, Samsung is announcing their new S-24, and their whole buzz is like, there's more software that's compatible with AI, right?

So, of course, they're going to use the AI buzzword, right? I don't think anyone uses Samsung anymore. Yeah. Only those that don't want to be assimilated. I mean, so full disclosure, I'm not on dad chats because I don't have an iPhone. They purposely leave me out, which is fine. but you know think about

being in an ecosystem where you can never leave think about like I get so used to doing something like you ask anyone with their iPhone like they could never get off their iPhone you are trapped and handcuffed and controlled you are controlled by Apple forever think about that

and nobody's going to control me I don't give a shit what industry we're talking about anyway but I'm a proud shareholder since 2004 so keep buying those iPhones But, you know, it's beautiful what they do. They listen. They have great user interface, great user experience. They make a ton of money now on the services side. It's not even hardware, right? And so in our business, we have to keep progressing. Like this podcast is an example. You know,

sales in its purest form is just communication, right? So now we're communicating at scale. We've got live audience right now. Maybe, you know, there's some people to have some time. It's Friday afternoon before spring purchase season gets busy, which by the way, things are getting busy now. But then you can cut up this content. You can repurpose it. People could watch it later. And so, you know, I started getting on LinkedIn because I was getting a lot of questions, you know, what's it like? What was the show like in New Orleans? And so, like, you know, I'm a live reporter on the scene. Here's what I'm learning, right? But then during COVID, people are like, dude, why is there no yield on a rate sheet? What happened to these rates?

where did non-QM go? Like, how come all those programs just blew up? And so instead of having like a thousand phone calls a day, I would just turn the camera around and, you know, and talk about it. And then I, you know, I'd get, you know, four, five, ten. I had one video where I shared the screen with Barry Habib, got 25,000 impressions, you know, because he's a draw, you know. He's the man.

And so you're just communicating at scale. So how do we, so my whole thesis is just kind of zoom back out at PRMG is how do we, you know, reduce friction, compress time, and then scale our business. So that's what I try and do. Like, I could sit there and go, you have too many loan officer assistance, you don't have enough volume, let's cut this call. That to me is math. Like, it's boring.

Like, I took calculus in college just to get an A because it's fun. You know, like math is math, right? So I know how to cut costs. I know how to be profitable. That to me, what you've got to do. But to me, that's not exciting. And I don't envy, like, your position because, you know, the buck stops with you, right? And so, so that's one part.

But what excites me is how do I help the top line revenue? How do I help generate revenue? So the math is a little easier on the backside when you're making bad decisions, you know, tough decisions, which we've had to do as a company, you know. And everyone does. It's part of our business cycle. So, yeah, I mean, in the TPO channel, we have a new portal. rolling out.

Nice. Completely new portal. We have some... Seamless portal? Like very easy. Draw your own docks. Brother, it's so good. The drawing docks is on our roadmap.

I don't think it's out day one. But we want to make sure we nail that right. Because we watch it goes on out there. We hear some people say, well, this one's good if you know what you're doing. This one, they hold your hand a little more. So we see who's doing what out there. So we want to try and hit the right sweet spot. But the disclosure piece will be more seamless with the dual A.

U.S. and that kind of stuff. And so, you know, we think we're, you know, I mean, gosh, at the end of 22, we were the 10th ranked wholesale lender, and I think seventh ranked and correspondent. Now, we've never tried to be number one that's like not our bag, you know. Let the big dog. Leave that for me. Yeah, let the big dogs in Detroit fight that out, you know, and then you guys can all fight amongst us. That's not my thing. You know, I'm like Switzerland, right? Like, you've got to maintain that. Yeah. And honestly, I like being in that space. because I don't have to pick, I don't have to use the word better, you know, like, like, you know, what is better, you know, like, I don't know.

Anyway, I don't get in all that. I just, I hate, I hate when people think they're better than someone else. As a Christian, you and I both know, right? Like, we won't profess like, like, I better, I know more, but we like to be number one. We like to compete, right? So don't get wrong. Of course you guys can't be number one, though, but, you know, you'll set up for 10. It's good.

Well, well, we, we. And it's fine. Like, number one, you don't even want, like, how are you going to get 10,000 people in Southern California in one building. It's not possible. Well, you could always offshore it, but that's a whole other discussion. But here's the thing. Five of our competitors in front of us went out of business. So just by standing our ground and being smart, not being done with money, you know, we're number five, right? You know, so it's like, you know, hey, you know, so a year ago when the market was starting to get tough

and we recognized it, our marketing team came up with this, like, kind of, kind of, you know, like rallying like we're all in right this is just four guys that own the company right so it's paul and robert who founded the company and these guys were high-powered originators they're in the high desert they're in hesperia and victorville and then you know worked their way down into orange county and they our offices in corona riverside county and then myself as a partner for the last eight years i've been to the company over 13 years and then gary malice who's our chief strategy um and capital markets officer so we have a good leadership team just four of us we don't own anybody in money. We're in a good spot. We've got some servicing that's spent off some revenue

and we sold some of it and, you know, we're ready. And so after last year being as tough as it was, we're like, hey, we're all in. Sounds pretty good. Let's run that slogan back another year. So we're all in, right? I mean, we invested, we have a brand new product and pricing engine. We think the best in the industry. We switched off of Optimo Blue onto Polly. And we think that's a better experience. We're having a new portal. We've got a lot of stuff we're working on. You're always working on something. You got to. And that's the whole point, right? That's why me and you click so well. We're just running. And we got four kids, but we're just hyper-go mode all day. The four kids.

Hyper-go mode all day. How are you driving so much innovation? Now, talk to me like your strategy. Now, you're out on the road. You're meeting people. Like, what are some of the things that you, you know, that you're doing to implement these strategies, and how are you driving so much innovation? Well, now this is interesting. So from a technology standpoint, now this is kind of funny. So my very first senior management board meeting for PRMG

was in April of 2016. I moved from Fort Lauderdale, moved my family here to Newport Beach, one and three-year-old daughters, dog and a cat, across the country. Dog died shortly thereafter. Then we had a son.

And then another daughter. But my very first meeting, I walked in, and I was sitting there, I was listening, and then our CEO was like, here's our new partner. We've never taken on a partner. Here's a new shareholder in a company.

Kevin, here's the floor. And what was interesting is, the first thing I said is, if we don't invest in technology as a company, we're dead. and the first channel that will feel it will be wholesale. You know, because you got to give some of these top leaders some credit, you know, these guys who we all know, not only do they invest in technology, they became Apple, right? So, you know, if you look at the two top dogs in Detroit, they created their own tech.

And now, leading industry with it. That's it. And so now, we have made a strategic decision. like we we don't want to develop our own tech so what we do is we look to other partners to help develop for us and so now we do stuff in-house we have an engineering team and we do create things that are proprietary but like we're not apple we're not Shopify and we're okay with that like that's why like being number five not investing tens of millions of dollars in tech like I'd rather put the I mean to be honest like tens of million dollars in our pocket like that's okay that's

okay, right, and still have a good business and slowly grow, allow other companies to take shots and develop certain things, and then we pull that tech into our ecosystem. If I'm out on the hunt and I see something that I like, then, you know, we have the ability, I don't have to take the burden on of developing everything. And that's not to say that. We came to that realization too. Like, developing the tech is very hard and you have to always innovate. And then it's like, you have to figure out the next innovation. And you've got to be like one step ahead of the next guy. And guess what? if you're not perpetually innovating your tech, by next year your tech is dead. Agreed.

So, you know, that's a good realization you guys came to and let the other guys who are tech companies just focus on tech. And the thing about tech is it evolves so quickly, right? So like you and I were talking earlier, I was, I'm an advisor with Rice Park Capital, which is they have a venture tech fund. These are the guys that created Finance of America. and, I mean, in center, blue water. I mean, they sold a company for $100 million in their last tech fund, and that's just one of their 10 investments.

So I'm a limited partner. I've got money committed to this fund, and then I'm also a strategic advisor. And we had a gentleman on there who's on our advisory board talking about AI today, and he said something I shared with you earlier. The first chat bot was created in a 1964. Like, think, like, what? Yeah.

I mean, it's nuts. that's like a micro AI, you know? But the concept, but the concept was, I mean, look, I mean, you know, people have ideas, you know, flying cars. Well, E-votles, they're about to, trust me, I'm getting one. Can't afford a jet, but I'll get the little mini, the mini drone. Yeah, the E-votles, I can't wait until they clear that. I'm not, I don't. What are they cleaning that?

26? I mean, look, it just, it, California will probably take longer, right? But you think I want to drive the freaking 55 to 91 every day back and forth? I'm going to fly over that stuff. my e-mortgage capital mug and be like, suckers, you know, porcel. I'm just kidding. But, yeah, this traffic sucks out here, by the way. So, so, you know. I don't know how much better it is in Texas. But like it, in Dallas, Houston's even worse. But think about that. Flying cars, right? It's been on the Jetsons cartoon forever.

It's about to be a reality, right? And so some of these ideas, like a chatbot, we use one internally, that I'm an investor in the series B&C around a company called Capacity. And I didn't know you were investing capacity. Yeah. How's that going, though? That's the AI bot that a lot of people are starting to adopt in the mortgage space. Yeah, it's fantastic. I mean, David Corondish and team, they're the best tech team that my vendor team at PRMG has worked with.

We have 250 vendors that we work with. They said that's the best tech team. Now, I will say there's a new tech team we're working with Truv, TRUV, and they do the verification of employment. Try and bust that work number bill down. What's that coming out? It's out. We use it. How much cheaper?

It's a big, big difference. We'll talk off the line. Yeah. We got to roll that out to our e-mortgage family here. You guys know what I'm talking about. Sucks, right? I know. And so, yeah, it's like every executive's like...

And as soon as you cut down credit reporting, anything on the horizon with that? I mean, you got to... It's the worst, dude. It's the worst. So... Softballs went up to $40? I know. It's more than that even.

I think it's even more than that. So, yeah, the bureaus, you know, see, okay, this is a perfect example why I'm not an iPhone user, okay? So, so. So I am, okay, this is a perfect example. When you are trapped and you are captive and you don't have options, then when someone has that kind of control over you, they just raise the price. We can't go anywhere. Now, the Vantage score model, you know, they're talking about that being part of the, like, the ecosystem, but that's still about a year out. Is it a year out?

I mean, spring and Q already rolled it out for a second mortgages. So you can run it and you can look at it, but you still got to run desktop underwriter or loan prospector. And that takes the FICO model. They don't have it geared up with a vantage algorithm. So the FICO algorithm, which is what TransUnion Experian and Equifax use, that FICO algorithm is the one that's tried, true, and tested in our industry. And the GSEs have DUNLP program. For FICO. They don't have a program for the Vantage scoring model.

Are they working on a Vantage score program? You have to. Because the FHFA, which is the regulator of Fannie and Freddie, they come out and said, everyone in the industry has to do a buy merge report. So instead of all three bureaus, you have to use two, but then also not just use the FICO 10T model, the trend of data or whatever, or 4.0, they have to use the Vantage 10T. So the industry is gearing up to have to use that. It's just not there yet.

And so what Fico and the bureaus did is they raise the prices, knowing that their business is about to get cut in on. They raise the prices. And so at P.RMG for two years, we've been running. We were first. We were actually the first for something. Remember push button get mortgage February of 2016? Yeah.

So all that was was Rocket getting active. access to day one certainty first. Okay. So, you know, and now all the other lenders scream like, come on, man, like, why'd you give it to them? You know, what about us? So we got something first. Little old PRMG. So we, um, we use blend as our point of sale. Um, and, um, we were able to use that to do soft pole three years, two years ago. We asked Fannie and said, well, can we just, they have a call early check? Can we use all three soft pole bureaus and run to you? And they're like, sure, let's try it. So we getting pegged it. And as you know, with a soft pull, there's no hard trigger lead, right?

And so then we went to Freddie and we're like, well, we're doing it with Fannie. Can you do it with us? Like, hell yeah. So we were just by being nosy and asking and our great team behind the scenes, we were the first lender in America to run both DU and LP, running a tri-soft pull and having no trigger leads. And back then the cost savings was huge, right? So then, you know, the whole goal here is like on your first call,

talk to the borrower, get it, like, do everything right there on the first call, including run, DUNLP, and like know whether you have a deal right there. Pull credit, do the disclosure, do everything, right? And so, um, then about 15 months ago, FICO raised the prices.

And we're like, hey, thank God we're doing soft poles. We've already kind of solved that. And then just a couple months ago, then all the bureaus and FICO raised the price for soft pulls as well. So there's no difference between hard and soft pole costs anymore, the same cost. So now you're like, you know, might as well do, unless you're still trying to avoid the triggers, right?

But then you've got to repul again when you're going to do DRLP. So there's a lot of talk in the issue. I mean, that is now our new biggest bill. So trans- That's what you're dealing with when you're going to the, when you're on the road. I'm trying, man. I mean, there's got to be, at the NBA conferences,

there's got to be a solution on the horizon before a year's time. Or we're going to be dealing with these credit bills for one year, solid at you know before the advantage model comes i i i bet the vantage model comes before you get off your iphone yeah don't don't say that you know i was a samsung user and uh for decades and then i i moved over to iphone i'm like wow this is i can't believe i've been missing this this whole time and then i can't leave i mean all kidding aside like it's amazing right so it's like but to your point like when you are captive to to any platform and you're captive to pricing it it's unfair we had a tech company we were dealing with and they just did this to all of our users like you can't do anything like we're

just going to change pricing you're you're stuck yep you know and it hurts it hurts for so i've been eye on the back and i'm solving for these issues for my people right and i'm like oh they just did this to all my people know how did i solve this you know so it does hurt it does hurt um let's jump into some of the, some of the economics now, because you're, you know, Kevin's one of the most brilliant mortgage economists in the industry. Uh-oh. And, uh, and people look to him to just kind of gain some insight as to what's happening in the mortgage marketplace and, and how we can kind of prep, right? So, you know, I mean, you've been talking, it's like, and we had a debate, like, I don't know, I don't, I don't personally feel that we will get a Fed rate cut this.

year. Even though some of the economists, and I heard you on your, your, uh, you know, your message to the public yesterday say, uh, a lot of smart people are saying that we're going to get a Q2. Um, not that many smart people are saying Q1. Um, I personally, I don't, I feel like if we get a Fed rate cut, it's going to really impact housing. Big time. Um, and, uh, the demand for housing already is surging. Like people can't, we're back to, you know, where there's 10, 20 offers on a property in certain. Um, um, and, uh, and the demand for, areas and you know you you you take rates down of five and a half percent like it's game on it's game on but you're not going to be able no one's going to be able to get a house offer accepted equity is going to

just go bonkers and we're still like the fed's not ready for a soft landing it we're not even close inflation's still terrible you know so i don't know i want to get your feedback going to get your ideas what what are people saying in the what are leaders saying and i no one has a crystal right but how do we you know kind of prep for all this sure well the good news is like there's no wrong answer until the fed actually cuts so so what so we're both just hypothesizing and we're all right right now i mean honestly like you could say well look at retail sales data and look at uh GDP it was you know 4% plus in q3 like the economies jobs haven't broken unemployment rate still low there's no way they're going to cut they don't want the inflation genie out of the bottle

the flip side is like you know the last three to six months inflation is on trend at 2% or under. So if they keep market rates higher, they're punishing lower socio-demographic and economic segments of our society more harshly. I think that that's like the trend. So I'm Egyptian. I talk to someone from, you know,

some smart people from Egypt and they're like, U.S. is headed towards like an Egyptian economy, like huge disparity between the low class and the upper class where the middle class are almost just like... So just so you know, I literally, I'm 47 years old. I have lived my entire life believing that because I look at Europe and I see, that's just what humans do.

I mean, Europe has been around way longer than, you know, our little 250 plus, whatever, how many years we are now, almost 250. Gosh, yeah, almost 250. Yeah. When I turned 50, we're 250. I was born in 76. I actually had a shirt yourself.

say, it said Spirit of 76. So I look at Europe, which has around thousands of years. You look at Asia, you know, India. Yeah, there's a massive disparity. You know the difference? The wealthy own real estate. So that's why I love what we do. We are literally helping people create wealth.

But that's the problem that for us as well, it's like we're having a harder time getting people to create wealth. Brother. How do we solve for that? It's not going to get easier. How do we solve for this? We're not solving, especially with guys that just, you know, the guy, the commissioner of the FHA, him passing is an issue for the lower middle class. So he was creating affordable strategies. 100%.

And there are a lot of people that are trying to create affordable strategy. But, you know, the base of the problem is, and by the way, I, you know, appreciate the kind words about, you know, what would I say on the economy? economy. I really like what Barry and Dan talk about on MBS Highway. I like the way they break certain things down. And they have some really great connections with some good guests. But, and I, and I listen to them when I'm in my office. I get a lot of information from stock analysts, right? So I have a lot of paid subscriptions for, you know, Stansberry Research or Louis Navalier Platinum Growth Club. for anyone who watches CNBC there's a guy named Tom Lee at Fundstrat. He's a former analyst.

I pay $100.9 a month to listen to their insights. And I mean, I'm getting, I'm on Zoom calls with these guys. And, like, I mean, I'm listening to it. So I try and formulate my thoughts gathering that information. But to kind of base it all down, we have a supply issue. So, I'm a major supply issue. And it's, and so I'll just talk about just two nuggets I got just yesterday, okay? So on NBS Highway yesterday, you know, talking about like housing starts and this and that.

And, you know, we're about, you know, a million new units being produced on a yearly annual run rate. And that's actually pretty good. I mean, it was down to like 700,000 new construction. So we're about a million, a little over a million a year. Household formation, 1.9 million households formed in that year. So we're behind. Now, the reason why we're behind, and this isn't a knock at the builder, is, I mean, I'm actually defending them.

So, Lenar and D.R. Horton. D.R. Horton's number one. Lenar's number two. And I was on a call with Lenar yesterday. I have a session coming up at the Ice Experience in Vegas. And there's an amazing woman, Maria Fregosi, who works at Lanar. And we were talking about this just yesterday. And so, you know, there aren't enough starter homes and home prices at the lower limit.

And so they're having some success in San Antonio with tiny homes. and Lanar. And so like 400 square foot homes, right? So if you think about India, Asia, and Europe, especially India and Asia, right? Like tiny homes. Lots of, you know, developing nations. I think a tiny home in Hong Kong is like a couple million bucks. Right? In Tokyo, I mean. Yeah. So you've got to move away from the urban centers, which with the work from anywhere, trend, that is a reality. Like, you know, you don't have to live in downtown San Francisco. you can move out, right? And so you can be out, you can be in vodkaville, you know, with, you know, the guys from

mortgage shots, you know. So you don't have to be in New York, so you don't have to be in L.A. You can move away. So as originators, we've got to fish in these other ponds, right? We have to find ways to help people get into homes further and further away from maybe where we live. The good news is the world is flat. The Internet helps us do that.

selling that kind of thing helps us. But there's less than 1% of the entire housing stock in America that has a $200,000 price point or under. And $300,000 price point under, it's less than 5%. So if you're a starter first-time homebuyer, you're looking for your starter home, what do you buy? So rates coming down help starter homes, first-time homebuyers get into maybe a $350,000, $450,000 house. they still got a save up for the down payment, which is getting harder to do, right? But that's the starter home right now,

you know, that with the median home price, I think, is over $400,000, right? $50,000, yeah. Right? So. And it's almost doubled in the last three years. It's crazy. Well, I mean, median home prices is almost doubled in three years since COVID.

Again, it's a supply and demand. Insane. D.R. Horton and Lenar, just the two top builders, are responsible for about 53, maybe somewhere as much as 60% of all brand new single family construction. Just two builders. So they can only scale so much.

Thank God they're there. Who else would be telling the load? There's a lot of custom builders. But for them to be able to build at scale, it's a long process, right? You know, they've got to find land, get the land, permit the land, work it out with the city. All these stupid municipalities with all their fees and their process to go through permitting, it's an extra $100,000 on average per home just to pay for all the crap before you start before you build the house you know so a lot of these cities have got to start giving subsidies

back they're raising taxes on everybody right which is a killer people in houses insurance costs that's a killer right it's making it harder for people already interest is going up taxes going up yep all the cost to build is like triple Yep. So some of these cities have to give back and create subsidies for new construction at certain price points. And then custom builders, you know, I do fix and flips on the side with some friends. I think our cheapest unit is in Palm Desert. We bought a house for $430,000 just to add another 1,000 square foot in a pool and hopefully sell it for a million. That's not a starter home, you know? I mean, it is a starter home by today's standards. A million bucks is sadly a starter home.

To buy a starter home now, you've got to make, what, $250,000 a year? Brother, it's hard for someone, you know, to afford that. So people are going to have to pool together, right? Multiple families living in homes, co-ownership, fractional ownership, equity sharing programs, down payment sharing programs. There's a lot of, like, innovative ways that are out there, but we have a real housing supply shortage. And I don't blame the builders.

Nobody bailed them out, no eight. You know, the government was so, fixated on, you know, 17 banks, you know, independent mortgage banks, like where I worked at, out of business, we all went out of business, you know, where PRMG, thank God, PRMG was Smedium at the time, right? So they were able, you know, Paul and Robert were able to get through, you know, they had enough money to pay all their debts and pay for buybacks and all the crappy loans, but they didn't have enough to kill them. And they got through it, thank God, you know. But if you were of any size, you went out of business. And nobody built the builders out.

So they said, okay, we see what's going on here. We're just going to sit back and we're just going to build at our pace to where the market will absorb it. So the days of them building thousands of homes and hoping if you build it, they will come, that strategy is dead. They're not doing that. You've got spec investors that do that, right? But the large... It will come. They build it.

They will come. They're just not building it. They're not... Well, they're keeping the supply imbalance to where they will come. they don't want to risk overbuilding because it's a two, three year proposition. And when you build out and you look for land that's way on the outskirts of Phoenix and then you go find something and then you build it out, you know, they aren't coming as much in Phoenix lately, right? So, you know, when rates get up to 8%, kind of, some of these projects are

sitting and not selling us fast. And so, so that's a real risk to the builders. So they're just not going to overbuild. And so when we were talking, you know, just to tease that the session half coming up in March, you know, Lenar was saying they're having great success with, you know, the tiny houses and thank God for them, you know, and trying to be innovative and, you know, have, you know, cheaper housing supply that's out there. So we... So they're selling tiny houses on... In San Antonio, yeah. Wow. And what's the tiny house go for? Is it a four? It was like 200 grand? I didn't ask the price point, actually. But I know it's under 300,000.

But think of the working class. You have a lot of migrants in Texas coming up to the borders. And, you know, every new construction home in America, on average, creates four jobs. So, you know, and you have a lot of people selling their house in California. And these aren't like Amazon purchased tiny houses. These are like real nice. Oh, yeah, Linar is like the quality of builder as it gets, right? And so you have people leaving California and moving to Texas, which drives the

prices up, but not for that starter home. So, you know, construction is booming in for sure in Texas. And, you know, these builders, they have to navigate, you know, do they do they overbuild just for the sake to make us happy, right? Because we got all these borrowers. And to your point, when rates come down, there's going to be even more demand and prices are going to go up even more. We know it. I still think that, um, I like the 6% range. I think we could stay here forever. I think we should just stop now, but, you know, they cut? I don't know. Well, yeah, I, so to get back.

Especially like six, seven, eight rate cuts. I mean, that's just going to, you know, affordability is going to plummet. So to get back to your point about, let's project, okay? Let's take some bets, okay? So I like doing this, right? So gun to my head, Kevin wins the first rate cut. I think it's May. Okay.

Now here's how I get to it. This is my thesis. And by the way, I kind of stand on an island here. Like, no one I know is saying may. I will say there are a couple people who are bullish and pro-housing. Like, for example, when I tell this where I'm about to tell you, one of my 10-year-old daughter is soccer teammates, her dad runs a couple funds for Pemco. And I'm like, yeah, I think the rate's going to come out in May.

He's like, oh, yeah, a typical mortgage guy. That's what you want, right? Of course you want lower rates because there's more business, right? And I said, well, hold on a second. You know, here's my thesis, right? So whatever it is, it is, like hope is not a strategy. We're going to keep doing business regardless of when the Fed cuts. The Fed on December 13 on their meeting, they put out the summary of economic projections,

the SEP, known as the dot plot. Okay, so all 19 members say this is how many cuts or how many, where we see the rates going to be next year, where the GDP and unemployment. like they're making projections for 24. The Fed, the whole board, said there will be 75 basis points and cuts in 24, okay? So they said they're going to be that. Now, they've been pretty good about doing what they say, but here's where I think it's going to be more than that. More than 75 basis points.

Yes. I mean, will they even do the 75 if they said it, will they execute? Are they obliged to execute that 75 base points? Because I think even that's a lot. Well, what's interesting is the last couple raises have been 25 basis points. So everyone is automatically going, well, 75 basis points, that's three cuts, right? There's a CME tool that I watch. It's a Fed Funds Future tool.

And anyone can go to CME Fed Fund's Future Tool. It's a graph. It shows institutional traders and banks. banks buying Fed funds futures. Like a futures contract is a cash settled contract and there's some that are expiring in March that say there will be a cut in March. So all that is is a hedging tool, right? So like we have a secondary pipeline. We take in 10 million dollars in locks today. Our pull through is 80%. So then we take $8 million of mortgage-backed security coverage to cover that $10 million in locks. So that's a hedge against our locked pipeline. Fed's fund future contracts

are a hedge for banks and institutional traders for their bond portfolio, for their stock. I read an article two days ago that in China, there is a version of COVID that is 100% lethal. So I don't know why they're doing this shit, but in their dumbass lab, which by the way, we know, in Wuhan, more than likely that's where all this shit came from, there's a 100% lethal COVID virus. If that thing gets out into the world and you are exposed to it, you will die. So let's say there's another pandemic starting today. What do you think would happen with the stock market, with treasuries? Every- With a lethal COVID? Any pandemic. You'll freak everybody out again. Here we go again, right? So what happens is everybody's stock prices go down because everyone's

fearing the worst, right? You know, World War III, global kickoff. There's a nuke that gets firing in Ukraine and Russia. I mean, anything could happen. So what happens is money, which is all we do, we buy and sell money. That's it. That's all we do. We just buy and sell money. You want to dumb it down to it?

And by the way, the secondary market is cold, heartless, and unforgiving. Everyone's like, okay, no one's going to be buying iPhones the next year. I'm selling my Apple stock, and I've put my money in the safest bet in the world, the U.S. Treasury. So what happens is the price of treasuries goes up because all these institutional traders are buying treasuries. yields go down, rates go down. Hell, the Fed may even start buying again. Just to say, hey, like, this economy is slowing down to a grinding halt again.

We need to keep the skids going, right? We need to keep the gears grinding. And so then they go buy treasuries. So those Fed funds future contracts that show that the Fed is going to go lower, they're in the money. Those guys who own those futures, they just made money, betting on where the Fed funds rate will be to offset the losses on their stocks and their bonds.

portfolio. So when you look at 150 basis points of cuts on the CME tool, which divided by 25 is six rate cuts, that's where everyone keeps getting that narrative. It's kind of a false narrative. Like when someone buys a Fed Fund's future contract, the question isn't, when do you think the Fed will start cutting? They're buying futures. And so as a hedge against their portfolio. So where I get my thesis, I think the Fed has told us there will be 75 basis. points and cuts. Fed Fund futures is betting as much as 150. I think it's somewhere in the middle. And if you were to ask me when they start and why, I think between now and May 1st, there'll be enough slowing of the economy. There'll be enough slowing of GDP and job creation. There'll be

more job cuts that the government, the Fed, will have to start easing back. Because like, what's interest rate sensitive? Obviously, mortgages. car loans, credit cards, personal loans, loans for small business. If you need a loan, which you don't, because you're a great business operator, 55% of all jobs in America are created by small business. You need a loan to keep going. You go pay 6, 7, 8% to a bank. Your business may not be viable enough to afford that rate, especially if the economy is slowing.

Commercial real estate? 19.5%. of all offices are empty. So when those notes become due and they got to refinance at a 6, 7% rate, you know what, those are non-recourse loans. Here you go bank, take the building back. Sorry.

Happening this year. It's happening now. Bankruptcy filings are up. So I'm not a doomsdayer. I think the soft landing was in December. And it only gets harder from here. It may not get that hard. They may, you know,

let some pain kind of make its way into our economy, but there's already pain being felt by the lowest end of our economic rung. You talk about that disparity and well, you know, just because inflation is slowing to 3.9 percent, it's still going up to 3.9 percent. Groceries are expensive. Food is expensive. Like, I'll eat the shit out some ramen noodles and I'll go to del taco all day long. You know, drink water, feed my my family of six, Del Taco, $28.

Right? Like, that's it. That's the best I could do in Newport Beach, right? So, uh, bucks a feet of family. Yeah, we get all the dollar menu shit

and we drink water. Filtered water from the tap. That's the best. Now, then of course, you know, when a week it comes, you know,

you know, maybe we go to what you was. Chipotle, kids meals, five bucks. Okay. And it's the best for adults. Okay.

It's almost like you would pay double. Okay. Because they, the portion control. We're at 30. That's $2 more expensive. And by way, I love Chipoli. And I ain't doing the kids meal.

I do the salad, the chicken salad. But my point is, it is still, like, inflation slowing is still inflation going up. This is going up at a slower pace. So people's wages are not keeping up with higher food costs. And, you know, we're having a somewhat tough winner, I would say. It was mild last year. So oil prices, I think, have found a floor, maybe, like, maybe in the high six. 60s, right? But as the winter comes long, there's now competing for that supply to heat our homes,

right? And then we get into the summer months. June is the biggest travel month of the year. People are paying for gas to travel. And so when food and energy prices continue to go up, it continues to hurt the lowest end of the economic, you know, wrong that are our nation. I'm not getting into conspiracy theory. I don't want to talk politics. You hear all this, oh, it's an election year. They're going to cut. They're going to help. you know, the Biden administration. I mean, you know, just for what it's worth, Jay Powell is a Republican,

but his board is made up mostly of liberals. And so, and for now, they have a consensus on their action, right? So I, if there is any thought of the board making some kind of action based on politics, if there was anything, is that they would want to cut sooner and get out of the way of the election. Like, I don't see them waiting until like,

September and then going, all right, let's cut. I think they've said they're going to cut 75 basis points this year. But people doing the cutting said they're going to cut 75 basis points this year. Every other Fed meeting, they put out a new dot plot in SEP. So the next time they will do that will be March 20th. So at the end of this month, January 31st, no dot plot. So they don't have to show their cards. And then March 20th, they have to show their cards again.

So do you think they're going to have less than 75? Because everything's getting so much better? I think if there's any trend for them to do is to show more than 75 basis points of cuts in the year of 24. Not saying they will have started in March, but I think as economic data weakens and inflation pace slows, they're more likely to say, you know what, we think there'll be 100 basis points of cuts this year. That doesn't mean they'll start in March. So I think, you know, the latest is July for the first cut. But I think to kind of like, I think there'll be some weakening data between now in May 1st.

And these market rates are so high, they don't need to keep them up there. All it does at this point is just hurt the economy, right? And so I know they're fearful of like letting the inflation genie out of the bag. But inflation was started because of a supply chain issue of COVID. Not because, you know, there was low rates. Now in housing, yes. Low rates does run up the housing price, and that's a big part, a big component of CPI and not as much as PCE, which is their preferred inflation gauge, the personal consumption expenditure, which comes out next week, I think, on Thursday, including Q4 GDP reads. So watching the data with bated breath, still working our ass off every day, you know, but gun to my head, I think may.

And just to be a little contrarian, I think it would be a 50 basis point cut, not 25. That's very contrarian. I'm the only one saying it. I love it. Well, I'm going to end on this note. I want to get three goals from you. I want, for 2024, what are your personal goals, family goals, and work goals, just to get it out there in the audience? So I'm going to start adding that to all of our pods.

And I want to, you know, someone like you, I want to know all three of those because you got a great family life, great work life. And the balance of all three of them are, I mean, all right, I guess. It's never good enough, brother. Right? Not according to your wife, no. Never. Never. Yeah.

Can't be. Yeah. Yeah. You know, she's from Michigan. She is a hammer. to bust my balls. And I deserve it, by the way. My wife is the same exact way.

I'm the fifth kid. She tells me I'm the fifth kid. I'm the fifth kid, too. Yeah. Well, I'm older. I think me and you are the biggest kids in the house. Totally. Yeah, drinking six glasses at Zools and a rocks in a cigar last night until 1 a.m. Yeah, I like, yeah, anyway.

I'm a big kid. So I actually, I had a, I had, I just started with a personal coach yesterday. And I have a new, nutrition, wellness, coach. It's funny, just a guy hit me up on LinkedIn like four years ago,

and I message everybody back eventually. And this guy was the strength and conditioning coach for the Anaheim ducks. I was like, dude, this guy Justin, like, he was a professional team. He must know his shit. So like, we take blood once a quarter. Nice.

And then we see what I'm lacking. And then we formulate like supplements for me to take four little supplements every morning based on what I need, right? and then I get the whoop band keeps track of my sleep data and he tells me how terrible I am at sleeping by working out all that kinds of at me.

Three hours of sleep is not easy. Last time was four to a half. So, you know, win. By the way, alcohol is the absolute worst thing for you for sleep. It is the worst thing. Oh, I fall asleep so fast every time. Yeah, me too.

I fell asleep on my phone. I woke up at 4%. But it's the worst for your restorative sleep. Your brain does not restore on alcohol. You can sleep nine, hours having had drinks and will not be as restorative as a six-hour sleep with no alcohol. And so my personal mental coaching is, I have a new coach, a second coach that's about mindset. How do I talk to people?

How do I not let my temper get the best of me? How do I be a better husband and father and be more present? Like, we don't need to pay for a coach to do that. But it's nice to have a neuroscientist kind of help you rewire, which is the name. in the company, rewire the way you think. And I'm trying to be intentional about that. So that's a personal and family goal. Less travel. I mean, I'm on the road 50% of the year. I took my family to Vegas last weekend. We had a soccer tournament for my 10 and 8 year old girls that played club soccer. And so that was a, you know, it's work because you're going around town and shuffling

around, but it's still fun, you know, like then we go eat at the Black Bear diner or baby stacks pancakes and, you know, we talk about the game and stuff. And just I spent like a whole, you know, three-day weekend, plus a road trip, that shitty-ass traffic going from here, you know, to Vegas, you know, bumper to bumper. I've no idea why, like, it's just always bumper to bumper. Anyway, four and a half hours, no matter how you slice it. So that was fun. Got a ski trip coming up with my family.

So I'm trying, there's a couple shows that I've cut out that I've delegated out. So those are my personal and family goals is to try and just be a little bit better at that, a little bit better every day, you know? And then as far as career-wise, we're growing. I mean, we are growing in all three channels. It's nice to have no more headwinds because rates have stopped rising and come down a little bit. But, you know, a tailwind with rates going down will be huge for everyone. So how do all these investments that we've made in our companies, how do they then, you know, get executed and help scale now in this year?

And we're built to scale and we're ready. So, you know, we've got some projects. We're rolling and, yeah, just continue to be positive. I mean, even last year, like, first of all, what's the point in being negative? Like, you know, this, it was interesting. So my coach, I'll share this with you, you know, yesterday. He was saying that your brain is wired to be on the defensive, right? Like, you know, you're a megal, right?

Like, you know, what's this threat? What's this threat? You know, like, you're always looking for threats. Like, what's threatening me? Right? You know, there was a white van parked in front of my house when I took my 10-year-old daughter to Lakers game Wednesday night. And I flashed my brides and I'm like, what was this guy doing here? In my neighborhood right there on Leeward, I flashed my brides as a threat.

So my brain is wired to reduce threats, which is why people are wired to be negative. And so you have to think consciously how to, you know, I'm not saying don't be observant of threats, but, you know, you've got to make sure that you're positive and go. okay threats but opportunities right what's the opportunity um anyway so that by the way just i know you guys want to hear the story um i flashed the brights and the guy all of a sudden pulls down his sunshade at 10 p.m. like was there a sunshade up like you know best case scenario it's a guy parking his man sleeping right worst case scenario he's part of that chilean group that's casing houses that are hitting our neighborhood up right so i back in my car and i keep the brights on he turns on his car to pull away so now i'm like okay so i pretend like i'm on the phone switch hands walk up

and I'm just staring at him in the mirror. I'm like about this far away from the mirror. He rolls down his window. I go, what are you doing? He goes, what? I go, you're on my street. He goes, it's a public street. I go, I own property.

Do you own property? Speaking of real estate. This is my street. Get the fuck out of here. And he just sat there, and he was back and away. And I go, get the fuck off of my street. So I told him, I got four kids. I don't want anybody by a case in my house.

There's an empty house across the street, you know, and maybe he was looking, you know, seeing the patterns and when people come home and lights turn off and this and that, who's there? If this car's out of the driveway, that means they're on vacation. This house is empty. What's in there? It's an open house for sale.

You know, I don't know. That's the worst case scenario, right? So you're wired to look for threats and reduce them. He seemed like a threat. He left. I mean, he left. And then I went circle around the block and make sure he didn't park any of the streets.

I went by your street too. And, of course, yeah, I saw two guys with open garages. and then I circle back. I'm always messing around. I'm always leaving my garage open. Dude, I'm at, I'm on my, I have so much crap in there. I'm like, I have like the alert. Like, babe, the garage is open.

It's been 26 seconds. You know, like, close the shit, you know? You know, so I've got the cameras, everything. You know, I'm not like a weirdo, but I'm just saying, like, people are robbing because there's no repercussion in this state. Where I'm from in Texas, like guys like that, you know, get shot and they get dragged in the house. Oh, he was in my house.

Okay, cool. Have a nice day. Right? And everyone's armed. In California, it's like, oh, they didn't steal more than, you know, $7,500 worth of stuff. Oh, there's nothing we could do, have a nice day. Like, the cops are like, it's like normal.

It's like normal life. There's no repercussion, right? So that's why I'm, you know, like, get the F out of my street, dude, you know, which by the way, light skin, light eyes with a Spanish accent, he could have been Chilean. Yeah. Or I thought he was, you know, Spanish. And so, you know, I didn't know what he looked like until he popped up and then took off. So obviously he felt guilty about something guilty enough to leave.

Hopefully he was just a vagrant living out of a van and, you know, he wanted a cool place to park. I don't think so. Parked in front of an empty house kind of hidden behind the bushes. Not on my watch. So anyway, we are wired to look for threats and that's why people can be negative. And so we have to rewire the way we think, take deep breaths, your first thought within three seconds, let that go. And think of another way to maybe say something, you know. And so I'm working on that.

to try and be a better coach. Because like, I mean, honestly, like, again, in our business, like, go make more phone calls, go do more loans, get out there. Like, like, I mean, this isn't a basketball court, you know, like, you know, like that doesn't, I mean, we all know that, right? Like, sometimes you do need a little kick in the ass. You're like, dude, get your ass out of here, man. You've been here for an hour.

Get, get, get. But on a longer, deeper level, we need, like, better coaching. Like, you know, hey man, I notice your production's down. What's going on? You know, is there something I can help you with? You know, is it, so, like can we make an incremental change like the social coach we talked about, which full disclosure I'm an investor in? And because I believe in it.

I'm not pimping it out because I invested. I believe in it first. And then the opportunity came up. But my point is, like, maybe I can help you get on social media and be a little bit better. Maybe I can help you go through your databases. There's something I can help you with. I've just noticed, you know, you know, so this is different ways to coach people longer term, to be more relationship driven as a leader and a mentor.

But again, there are still times where you're going to be like, dude, come on, man. Like, get your ass out there. You're like, what are you doing? You've been in the office way too long. This is your 15th cup of coffee. You're not a closer. Dude, Kevin, awesome, awesome podcast. Thank you so much.

Of course, brother. You drop so many nuggets on people, personal, economic. I mean, just so many nuggets today. I hope everybody at EMC gets a chance to watch today's podcast. Incredible nuggets were provided by Mr. Kevin. Evan Parano himself. Thank you guys so much. Make sure you subscribe. God bless you guys. We'll see you guys next Friday. Cheers. Thank you, brother.