Dave: Not knowing the size of your pipeline when you are getting “too busy to market,” I can’t address your specific situation effectively, but I can say this: I have heard your refrain from thousands of loan officers throughout my career. If you are closing 15 loans per month and don’t have an assistant, that may be the basis of a solution.
On the other hand, if you0 are closing 2 to 3 loans per month, you are likely using your pipeline as an instrument of call reluctance. Of course, there is a wide chasm in-between these two situations.
I can address certain important aspects of time management that may help you. Let's start with the most important one: you must make sure your loans are not only well documented upfront but underwritten as well. Yes, you heard me right. I feel that a great originator must underwrite their loans as they take them. You should not be waiting for an underwriter to tell you what you need.
Of course, there are questions you may not be able to answer, but you should get those questions answered upfront. Bring in poorly documented and/or poorly structured files and you will never have time to market because you will always be fighting fires.
Assuming that you are not wasting time because your files are not well documented and complete upfront, then we can turn to the issue of marketing consistently, effectively and efficiently. If you have a small pipeline, but that pipeline is keeping you from marketing, then there is a good chance that you have a good deal of marketing reluctance. In this case, the pipeline becomes an instrument facilitating this reluctance. In other words, it is a place for you to hide.
Dave Hershman is Senior VP of Sales of Weichert Financial and the top author in the mortgage industry. Dave has published seven books, as well as hundreds of articles and is the founder of the OriginationPro Marketing System and Mortgage School – the online choice for expert mortgage learning and marketing content. His site is www.OriginationPro.com and he can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
