00:11from the heart of the financial district in New York City at the Stock Exchange I'm Allison
00:15LaForgia and for this episode of 10 Minute Talks I'm sitting with Taylor Stork the president of
00:21the Community Home Lenders of America Taylor thank you for joining me today I gotta tell you I'm so
00:26happy to be here anecdotally I worked in Manhattan for a very long time in my career my office was
00:33up on 42nd Street I had an office on Park Avenue and do you know that this is the first
00:39time I have
00:40not even not only been to the to the to the New York Stock Exchange but obviously been inside the
00:45New York Stock Exchange you got to walk the floor I got to walk the floor during trading hours this
00:49is kind of huge for me right now so thank you very much for having me thank you for joining
00:52us we're
00:53following up our conversation at the gathering you're back in the hot seat again and we left
00:58by talking about how CHLA and you specifically were heading into Washington to put advocacy into action
01:07by bringing actual lenders into the room with policymakers after your meetings in DC where do
01:14you feel these conversations moved from discussion for real momentum yeah so great question and I feel
01:21like we did that interview 15 minutes ago no it just it feels like yesterday it it it was really
01:27interesting going into Washington and experiencing how important the executive order from President Trump
01:36on opening up access to mortgage credit actually is we met with a number of different policymakers from the
01:46executive branch we met with the CFPB we met with Treasury we met with FHA we met with HUD and
01:53and some
01:54others and universally in every meeting the conversation shifted back to the executive order and the priorities
02:03of the executive order and how different policy proposals are going to impact that executive order how we
02:11actually make changes to the system to comply with the executive order I was I was really surprised and
02:18amazed at how focused everybody was on the order itself it felt like everybody was saying look we got it
02:27we
02:28got a memo from the boss that we got to do some stuff and we need you to help us
02:31figure out exactly what
02:32to do so that we can get this stuff done for the boss so that we can put more Americans
02:35into homes I think that's great I've seen a lot of
02:38conversations across social coming out of this administration and different positions or different
02:44groups within the administration about housing yeah and I'm excited to see that that's something that's a reality
02:50moving into our next question CHLA has positioned itself as a bridge between independent lenders and
02:58decision-makers on Capitol Hill what did your members gain by having direct access to regulators and lawmakers that
03:04they wouldn't get through traditional lobbying channels yeah and I'm gonna reverse that because I also think
03:10that the regulators and the administrators gained a lot from our members traditional lobbying channels
03:18involve bringing in third parties that speak the language and are part of the system but it loses
03:26something it loses the perspective of an operator that sits with borrowers at the kitchen table or works through
03:34loan files or struggles to find a way to put a family into a home when when we bring the
03:44actual lenders into the room to sit with the
03:48heads of the various different agencies they gain a first-person perspective on what the challenges are that we run
03:57into as a result of different
03:59policies and that provides our members an opportunity to understand how policies actually get created why sometimes things that we
04:10think make no sense why
04:13those things are pervasive in the way we lend but it also gives us an opportunity to provide real-world
04:20examples to the actual regulators and
04:23administrators and policymakers themselves we were we were with CFPB and CFPB was very focused on questions surrounding
04:32TRID they were focused on timing requirements they were focused on any issues that cause friction in a mortgage transaction
04:41that makes it
04:42difficult for a family to move into their new home and one of our members sitting at the table brought
04:48up an anecdotal story about a
04:50family who made some last minute revisions on the negotiated transaction with the realtor and the sellers and as a
04:59result of that the closing disclosure needed to be reissued
05:02and that caused the family to not be able to move into their new home for three days and
05:10our our our member was able to explain that there are technical requirements built into trid
05:18that actually cause harm to borrowers and their families and that in many cases there are some
05:25simple fixes that can remove friction making lending a little bit easier and ultimately a
05:32little bit less expensive for everybody now that's an example of where you were able to put
05:37a member in a room with a policy or lawmaker and really shift perspective on a conversation
05:43can you give me another example of a moment where you felt that same shift between a lender being
05:51able to provide an example to a policy maker i can't think of another single no i'm only kidding
05:56uh imagine yeah that would be it would be really terrible so you know another issue that we brought
06:03up had to do with appraisals and if you read the executive order that came out in march
06:09there was a distinct item focusing on appraisals in general and one of the positions that chla
06:17advocates for is aligning appraisal standards within the government lending sector so that
06:23standards for fha loans the standards for va loans are similar if not the same which we believe will
06:29reduce the expense of originating loans in general but also will promote more access to homeownership
06:34for both veterans and first-time homebuyers because oftentimes the appraisal is seen as an impediment
06:40to which offer is being accepted by a seller we were able to sit in the room with the leaders
06:47from fha
06:48and from jenny may and directly explain why some of these things how some of these things impact the
06:54lending environment but beyond that we hosted a roundtable and during that roundtable we had invited
07:03representatives from many different segments of the real estate and mortgage ecosphere we had folks
07:10there from hud we had folks there from jenny we had folks there from cfpb and from fhfa and they
07:17were able to hear firsthand from our members the stories about some of these points that create friction
07:25and we had we had some aha moments it was interesting to see when we were able to take policy
07:33issues and
07:34convert those into the real world impact of those policy issues and people were able to suddenly see that
07:40there are some really simple fixes to things that will make owning a home easier zeblo and i talk
07:46about this a lot because both of us transacted zeb has still has his originator's license i was in real
07:53estate prior to joining housing wire and there's so much to be gained from actually transacting and going
07:59through all of those hurdles yeah because you have the on paper version yeah and then you have the reality
08:05of a lot of these policies or a lot of the requirements to actually transact where you
08:10sort of learn all of these little sticky points right yeah where you have the opportunity for things
08:15to go really really well or for things to blow up so i think that that's a fantastic point that
08:20you make
08:20and this wouldn't be a conversation unless we followed up about credit modernization yeah down payment
08:26challenges and housing affordability in general are some of the many competing priorities that are in
08:33washington right now how is chla making sure community lenders stay part of the decision
08:38making process instead of reacting after policies are already drafted yeah so that's actually a great
08:44question part of the answer is that we stay in front of policy makers on a regular basis a large
08:51part of the
08:51heavy lifting is actually maintaining the relationships uh we have active ongoing relationships with policy
08:59makers with legislators with elected officials and we have been able to develop enough credibility and
09:07reputation with them that they will routinely communicate with us early um asking for input asking for support
09:16asking for um impact on you know how different decisions might impact our members but that's that's only half the
09:27battle it's a big piece of it but that's only half the battle the other piece is that we need
09:32to be
09:32proactive and stay informed when policies catch us off guard it means that we've missed an opportunity to
09:39participate in the conversation and it likely means that we are not doing everything we need to be doing so
09:47uh a great a great example is credit modernization there are a number of different impacts there are a number
09:54of
09:55different impacts on changing how we look at credit and ultimately it all feeds back to the safety and
10:04soundness of fannie mae and freddie mac and candidly the safety and soundness of fannie mae and freddie mac
10:10are critical for everybody in the housing business regardless of where you sit in that ecosystem so we were the
10:18first organization to come out and say that there are certain standards that need to be retained
10:23um that a complete set of data on a borrower is important for safety and soundness and we were able
10:31to do that proactively and have a conversation and a seat at the table i think um one of the
10:38values of
10:39our organization is that we are both very grassroots and very democratic um in terms of how we develop our
10:48positions we are also pretty forward in promoting our thoughts and our ideas and our policy positions
10:58we're very focal on those policy positions and sometimes i think we act as a little bit of a
11:03counterbalance uh when the industry needs a little bit of a counterbalance now to wrap up today's
11:10conversation you just are coming off of a fresh bash of meetings in dc yeah what is your biggest takeaway
11:17about where the administration and congress are actually aligned with lenders and where do you
11:22see a disconnect between policy makers and what's happening in the general housing market yeah the um
11:29the road to housing act i think is a great example because there is bipartisan support to
11:37pass legislation that will fundamentally make it easier for borrow for buyers to get into homes for
11:43borrowers to finance their first home and for me it i get a little bit emotional about it it's it's
11:49it's
11:50really important that we all understand every family needs a roof over their over their head uh
11:56every every parent needs a safe place for their child to sleep and it doesn't matter whether you're
12:02republican or democrat liberal or conservative it doesn't matter your walk of life i i've always believed that
12:09housing supersedes politics uh i was raised that way uh my family has been in housing and in the military
12:19and in lots of different areas that that intersect which is probably how i ended up here the the
12:24takeaway to answer your question is that this administration combined with the the leaders in
12:31congress are working hard to find ways to make housing less expensive they're working hard to find ways
12:37ways to enable first-time home buyers to enter the market uh specifically and and importantly during
12:45a period of time where we have unbelievably low levels of supply so it's very difficult and to see
12:53folks on both sides of the aisle coming together to pass the road to housing act and to fulfill many
12:59of
12:59the things we've been calling for for years is just it's heartwarming and it's it's it gives me a sense
13:05of
13:06optimism what a fantastic note to end on i love to see unity from both sides of the aisle to
13:12come
13:12together for something that is a net benefit for the american public yeah me too taylor thank you so
13:17much for joining me can't wait to see you again allison thank you for having me
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