by Michele Newbern Gillis
Staff Writer
Terry and Joanne McLeroy can almost sit at their dining room table and complete an entire real estate transaction.
Terry is a mortgage broker and owner of Mortgage Acceptance Corporation of Jacksonville. Wife Joanne is a real estate broker, property appraiser and owner of Ocean State Properties.
How has it been being in this business over the last year?
Not bad, they say.
“It is a very slow market,” said Terry. “It’s nowhere near what it was the last few years as everyone knows. We’ve actually been very fortunate and blessed. Right now, we are busy. Mortgage Acceptance is very busy right now while a lot of other ones are not. There are mortgage companies closing their doors daily.”
Joanne runs her real estate appraising businesses from her home while Terry has an office on Jacksonville’s Southside with 14 licensed mortgage brokers. He said he does mainly residential loans, but also does some commercial loans.
The McLeroys attribute their success to always giving good service.
“We are honest with our customers and stay in touch with them when it’s necessary,” said Terry.
Though both are very demanding careers, the McLeroy’s have found a way to put the reins on and focus on what is important.
“I try not to work on the weekends,” said Joanne. “I tell my clients that I have a family. That’s my down time.”
Terry tries to only work on Saturday and take Sunday off to be with his family.
The McLeroys have been married for 20 years. They met through their respective jobs when Joanne took a class on how to pre-qualify buyers where Terry was the instructor.
“I was teaching classes and she happened to be in the audience,” said Terry.
They talked after class and started dating.
Terry gave some advice to other couples who are both in the real estate business.
“Try to keep it separate,” said Terry. “You have your business and your married life. You need to talk about that first and if you need to talk about business occasionally, then that’s OK too. But, separate it.”
They have one daughter, Kristin, 17.
Joanne has owned her own company for 12 years. Before that, she worked under Paul Deese, as a property appraiser for six years.
Before real estate, she worked for a local cable company in the payroll department until she decided she wanted to go into real estate.
She got her license and went to work for ARMS Corporation and then did some site sales for builders.
She earned her broker’s license and started working for Paul Deese as an appraiser.
“I was able to get enough business for myself without him feeding me work, so I decided to go out on my own,” said Joanne. “Your income is substantially higher when you get the full commission.”
Even though she is a real estate broker and an appraiser, she doesn’t mix the two.
“I can’t do it for the same properties,” she said. “Or you can, if you disclose it, but I won’t. If I’m involved in the sale, I won’t do the appraisal.”
But, it seems she has enough of both businesses to keep her busy. She gets up every morning at 4:15 a.m.
“I get up get ready, get my daughter up for school and am normally at my computer before 6 a.m.,” she said. “I start typing up appraisals and get work done before the phone starts ringing.”
Terry also gets up at 4:15 a.m.
He gets to his office by 6:30 a.m. and makes sure to head home by 5 p.m. to miss the Southside traffic.
Currently, Joanne is doing more appraising than selling real estate and, in this market, that is not always fun.
“I pull the comparables which are based on current sales,” she said. “People are so used to the 15 and 20 percent increase a year and they are not getting that now. They get a little upset when they don’t see a significant increase in value. The market is just flat right now. When they bought it, they borrowed a 100 percent. A lot of them are trying to drop mortgage insurance, but you can’t do it because the value hasn’t increased enough. For awhile, it was just amazing. Before the market turned recently, everything was just increasing.”
How has the change in the market affected her business?
“It has slowed down,” she said. “I’m doing a lot more requests to drop mortgage insurance.”
Terry has been in the mortgage business for 23 years.
He started out with Chase Home Mortgage for about four years and, before he opened his own company, he worked for Mortgage Resources for 12 years. He opened his own company, Mortgage Acceptance Corporation of Jacksonville 5 1/2 years ago because as he says, it was a great opportunity.
So, how’s the mortgage business going?
“It’s turning a little bit, but I don’t think we’ve hit the bottom of the foreclosure market yet. Sales and refinances are starting to pick up but we still have a ways to go for the market to correct itself. But, what does not need to happen is the federal government bail out these people. Let the market correct itself. That’s what needs to happen. It’s happened before and it will happen again.”
Terry said he and Joanne try to work together as much as they can.
“Sometimes it just doesn’t work out for whatever reason,” he said. “She does do a lot of appraisals for my office. There’s never been a problem with that. The lenders have known me for years and they’ve seen her work.”
Joanne said the lenders also have her review a lot of other appraisers work.
“I do a lot of review work,” said Joanne.
Joanne is a member of the St. Augustine Board of Realtors, Northeast Florida Association of Realtors and the Amelia Island/Nassau County Association of Realtors
“As a Realtor and an appraiser, it helps me get my sales data to appraise properties,” she said. “I cover Duval, Clay, St. Johns and Nassau counties.
Terry is a member of the Jacksonville division of the National Association of Mortgage Brokers.
When they are not working, they enjoy attending sporting events and traveling.