Larry Williams has been a mortgage loan officer with SunTrust Mortgage, Inc. on Amelia Island for one year.
WHAT DO YOU DO?
“I originate mortgage loans. The advantage of SunTrust Mortgage, Inc. is two things. One is the service and value that we bring. Second, since we are affiliated with a banking institution, we have a large number of portfolio products outside of conventional lending so we are able to meet a lot of needs across the spectrum.”
HOW’S THE ISLAND DIFFERENT?
“There are a lot of people who own rental properties or have second homes. They have a wide variety of needs we have both portfolio and conventional products to meet those needs.”
BEFORE SUNTRUST?
He had his own company and was an executive recruiter in the biotech bio-med discipline since 1994. “I was a recruiter, executive search consultant, headhunter, whatever you want to call it.”
WHY GO INTO LENDING?
“I wanted to be in a business that focuses on relationships. When I started my business, it was focused on relationships. It was really relationship based. I partnered with companies and became part of their team in the hiring process. Well, it became more and more driven by price and less driven by relationship. Everything was being done by e-mail or telephone and there were no relationships.”
BEFORE RECRUITING?
He was in the human resources area with American Federal Savings in Jacksonville. He also ran a few of their branch offices from the retail side for about five years. Before that, he was in the Navy for 10 years. “I was a reactor operator on a nuclear powered submarine based out of Charleston, S.C.”
AREA HE WORKS
Amelia Island, Nassau County and a little in Jacksonville. “It really depends a lot on who my clients are because one of the main stays in my business is previous clients. My previous clients are a great referral source, so wherever they have a property is where I’m going to work.”
WHERE DOES HE GET CLIENTS?
Previous clients and Realtors.
HOW ARE REALTORS IMPORTANT TO YOU?
“Realtors are extremely important. They are the hands-on in the transaction. The Realtors here handle a multitude of types of transactions. There are a lot of cash transactions and tricky financing. They are important to me because they are going to potentially send business my way. There are some Realtors that I work with who are referral sources for me and they have been great sources.”
WHAT IS THE ONE BEST THING THAT YOU COULD TELL REALTORS?
“Let’s work together early in the process with your client, so we don’t come up close to a short closing date. We can get the preliminaries out of the way such as the pre-qualification or pre-approval or whatever works for that particular client. We get that out of the way before we get to some sticky issues later on that may hold up the closing.”
MOST DIFFICULT PART FOR THE CLIENT
“Staying in touch or up to date on their loan in process and what’s happening with it. That’s why we try very hard to stay in touch with our clients on a regular basis and return phone calls by the end of the day. I work hard so you don’t have to.”
HOW ARE THINGS DIFFERENT TODAY?
“If you look back at how things used to be, 45 or 60 days to closing was no big deal. That was just traditionally how it went. Now, we are doing it in 15-30 days and over 30 days, they want to know why we are so slow. The age of technology has caught up and our technology is a big help. Everything is so fast.”
WHAT IS THE BIGGEST ISSUE FACING MORTGAGE LENDERS TODAY?
“The customer is extremely educated today in the lending process, yet there are still a lot of nuances that they don’t understand. The amount of advertising and media input that the clients get pretty much boils down to rate. Everything is rate-based. I can have two or three rate changes in one day based on what the market is doing. It is very critical to communicate and understand that my job here is not just to sell a mortgage. My job is to hold their hand, work with the Realtor and make sure everyone is happy. I also make sure they know what the cost is. Rate and cost have nothing to do with one another. The rate you get and what ultimately pay for that mortgage are two separate things. I have
-by Michele Newbern Gillis