ussmex

The Next Leg up in Financials

I am a loan officer at a direct mortgage lender. We have ceased spending money on advertising, as Citimortgage is giving their mortgage debtors our phone number in order that they refinance through our company. Citimortgage tells their clients that they're doing this "because of the high volume of calls they're receiving". While I'm sure it's true that they've slimmed down their staff and can't handle the volume of refi applications, it's probably also true that they are depending on us to pay off loan balances and sell the mortgages to another investor. Direct lenders around the country are taking these Citimortgage calls. I'm guessing this is one way Citi is raising cash to stay afloat. ETrade is probably employing the same stategy. Just remember that you need some pretty good credit to get the best rates these days. You also have to prove a decent debt-to-income ratio with income documents, and you need at least a little home equity. For that reason I doubt it's a strategy that is ridding them of a typical "toxic" mortgage. With 30 year fixed rates down in the range of 5 year ARM rates from years past, however, companies like Citi and ETrade will be able to take a good number of ARMs off the books.