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Dawn Kells Meshel, executive vice president of operations and enterprise execution for Plaza Home Mortgage, explains how the company combines specialized products, responsive service and technology to support its wholesale mortgage lending and correspondent clients. As margins remain thin, Plaza is focused on making third-party origination (TPO) lending strategy faster, easier and smarter while maintaining the high-touch approach that has defined the company for more than 25 years.
Meshel also shares how mortgage technology partnerships support Plaza’s broader business strategy. Polly gives the company the pricing flexibility needed to build a granular mortgage pricing strategy, improve efficiencies and remain responsive to changing market conditions. These capabilities allow Plaza to strengthen its product-driven approach while continuing to delight clients, partners and associates.
“Polly’s product line was exactly what we needed. They offered a product that gave us the ability to get as granular as we possibly could with our pricing strategy,” Meshel said.

The conversation also explores how Plaza Home Mortgage’s experienced people, strong culture and commitment to client service support its long-term growth strategy. Meshel offers mortgage leaders practical insight into balancing automation and AI with the human expertise required to navigate complex loans, strengthen client relationships and remain competitive as the industry continues to evolve.

“Truly, it is our service. Our people are the most important part of it. We've been in business for twenty-six years and our strategy has always been to offer the right products. We are known as a product lender, serving our correspondent and our wholesale clients,” Meshel said.
The New York sessions: Deals, decisions, and direction is powered by Polly.
Learn more about Plaza Home Mortgage. https://www.plazahomemortgage.com/
Learn more about Polly. https://polly.io/
Follow Plaza Home Mortgage on Linkedin. https://www.linkedin.com/company/plaza-home-mortgage/
Follow Polly on LinkedIn. https://www.linkedin.com/company/pollyex/

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Transcript
00:00As with all of our vendor partners, Polly's product line was exactly what we needed.
00:04They offered a product that gave us the ability to get as granular as we possibly could with our pricing
00:10strategy.
00:20I'm Dawn Michelle, EVP Operations Enterprise Execution at Plaza Home Mortgage.
00:24I've been at Plaza for 16 years.
00:26Our core business model is TPO. We serve wholesale and correspondent clients.
00:31I grew up in Connecticut and I was a summer teller at a bank in Connecticut.
00:35I went to college in Arizona.
00:36When I graduated from college, it was the natural path to look in some kind of financial industry.
00:41And I got a job as a personal banker at a bank.
00:45A year after I had that job, I got a job as a lock desk coordinator at a mortgage company.
00:50And then just from there, kind of expanded my career in the mortgage business.
00:55I think after about two years working in locks and I moved to different strategies in the lock area and
01:02secondary and capital markets,
01:03I just loved the mortgage business and I wanted to learn as much as I could.
01:06I worked for an IMB and the CEO of the IMB was very encouraging and wanted to teach anybody who
01:13would listen and wanted to be a part of it.
01:15I mean, I think after probably about five years in the mortgage business, you realize that there's no turning back.
01:20And I've done almost every position, every job in this industry.
01:24I do love what I do.
01:25I like that it's always changing and I like that I can do lots of different things.
01:30And my experience kind of lends itself to that.
01:34Seems kind of cliche to say that I like serving, you know, like helping people get into homes.
01:39But it is exciting and the industry is always changing.
01:44Our mission statement is to maize and delight our clients.
01:48We have the products and the technology and the service that is supportive to our clients and our peers.
01:55Our people are the most important part of it.
01:57We've been in business for 26 years and our strategy has always been to offer the right products.
02:04We are known as a product lender serving our clients, which is our correspondent and our wholesale clients.
02:10Our technology, obviously everyone's talking about technology, especially at the last few conferences.
02:15AI is huge, but technology is really important too, which lends us to our vendor partnerships.
02:22The right partnerships are critical to Plaza because our vendor partners and any other partnerships, investor partnerships, are an extension
02:30of Plaza.
02:31Poly's product line was exactly what we needed.
02:34They offered a product that gave us the ability to get as granular as we possibly could with our pricing
02:39strategy.
02:40Our partnership with Poly is really critical to our success because obviously capital markets is where the revenue is.
02:46Margins are pretty thin and it's important to be as efficient and productive as possible.
02:53We're focused on faster, easier, and smarter, better technology.
02:57AI is going to be a huge part of that for us.
03:03Culture is obviously really important because that's what keeps people engaged in the vision
03:09and the strategy of the company, and we have, since we have been in business for 26 years,
03:14we have quite a few employees and associates that have been with us for over 10 years.
03:19The culture is, it's very, it changed a lot after COVID and, you know, everyone being remote,
03:24but it's a definite focus for us as a company to engage people.
03:29So it's, you know, you have to engage people with video and conferencing and in-person events,
03:34which we strive to do as often as we possibly can.
03:37We're an IMB, there's quite a few in this space.
03:39We are a high-touch lender.
03:41We have a lot of skilled and experienced professionals that are at Plaza
03:44and we pride ourselves on helping our clients.
03:48Our mission statement to Amaze and Delight is truly to engage our customers,
03:52our clients, and our associates.
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