Our resident Chief Financing Rock Star, Trevor Curran, was a Mortgage Banker for 30 years. His specialty was helping first time homebuyers with low down payments to achieve the American Dream of Home Ownership.
From the early days, with no computers, no internet, no email nor a beeper on his belt—until the day of his retirement in 2018, a mortgage loan application was all about the paper. Documents to support the application needed to be submitted, reviewed, dissected, parsed, and collated.
Trevor’s clients submitted their documents in many and varied ways, including coffee-stained tax returns, crumpled paystubs pulled out of an old wallet, and badly-scanned PDFs.
Considerable time was spent by Trevor and his loan processing team to put these documents into a manner acceptable for review by an Underwriter.
And of course there was the pushback from clients.
“Why do you need that (document)?”
“I can’t find my tax return.”
“The dog ate my homework.” Oh, wait, wrong story.
Trevor’s response, time and time again, including in the early days when he would literally drive to the clients’ home, workplace, a McDonald’s parking lot, or the real estate office, to pickup their required documents, was, “We need these documents because the bank requires it since you’re asking the bank to lend you several hundred thousand dollars.”
This obvious message was delivered in a kind and patient but firm manner.
Still, it always seemed incredible, time and time again, how people could be so cavalier about their loan application requirements. “Don’t they want the house?” he would often ponder in the moments of extreme frustration.
Now, as the primary processor for Aurora Consulting, Trevor’s manages the document flow and the loan applications for our business clients. When we launched this business we remember discussing how this document issue is going to be so much better because we’re dealing with serious business people.
Unfortunately, we were mistaken.
Especially over the past eight weeks as we have assisted over 30 businesses to apply for and receive Government Disaster Relief financing, the poor quality of document management is mind-blowing. Especially at a time like this, when the desperation of keeping a business alive requires this emergency infusion of cash. You’d think business owners and their representatives (CPA’s, mostly) would be sharper than ever to get documents submitted in an organized and prompt fashion.
Again, mistaken.
Moral of the story for anyone thinking they want to ask a Bank or Lender for money—whether you’re buying a house or financing a business—it’s all about the paper. Organize your documents, submit them in a clean, efficient manner, and submit them promptly.
Rant over.
Send us a message with how you’ve successfully managed your team to understand your high level of standard when it comes to managing your documents.
If you are aware of factor financing, you may know that you can leverage your Accounts Receivables with a Factoring Lender to get quick access to working capital. However, you may be concerned what your Customers will think when they have to send their payments to a different address.
There are business owners that are still focused on how they can conduct business today based on the old normal. We’re here to say that you might as well flush that notion down the toilet. It’s a sad reality indeed. We’re not saying that a business cannot be prosperous in today’s climate. No! We are merely saying that there are conditions that must be considered on how you can market your business. We need to reconcile in our minds that this is a “new normal” paradigm.
Who else is an avid fan of Warren Buffett? The “Oracle of Utah” presided this weekend over the annual—virtual—Shareholders meeting for Berkshire Hathaway. Mr. Buffett was a stout, granite-like, believer in the recovery of the American economy after the crash of 2008. This time, not so much.
