Episode 6: LO Comp, Basel III & Mortgage's New Platform Era

This week on No Surrender, we’re pulling on every thread the mortgage industry can’t stop talking about right now.

• LO comp
•  Mortgage’s New Platform Era
• What will appraisals look like in 5 years?
• Basel III and the IMBs
• Erin Dee on Hinge and what does that mean for the Charlotte Metro Area? 

Some of these conversations are serious. Some are ridiculous. Most are probably going to start arguments.

That’s exactly why you should tune in.

LIVE Thursday at 1PM EST with Greg Sher, Erin Dee, and Coby Hakalir.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:39

Hello from the other side.

SPEAKER_05 0:41

What's up, Adele? Looks chilly.

SPEAKER_04 0:46

Kobe, what's the weather like over there? I have no idea. I uh as you know, I work remotely and I'm inside now. So there's really no way for me to know. Uh and I and I wouldn't want to give you wrong information.

SPEAKER_01 0:58

So I wouldn't want you to think you, I would think you were AI, honestly.

SPEAKER_04 1:01

Yeah. Well, you know, a lot of people ask me that, but but I'm actually a real person, uh, even though I have no idea what the weather is.

SPEAKER_05 1:09

Yeah, it's amazing. Hey, how do you like my garb today? Is this good?

SPEAKER_01 1:13

It's it's beautiful. The homage to Adele is is is uncanny.

SPEAKER_05 1:19

Well, it was either this or what I'm actually wearing, which you know, it took you guys seconds to ask me if I was a tablecloth, if I had been on an interview. What was the other question? If you're in court today. So this is not a this is Vince, man. Don't you know Vince? Not a good look, huh?

SPEAKER_04 1:37

It's it's a nice shirt. We're just not used to seeing you in uh, you know, with with with a real shirt. Right.

SPEAKER_05 1:43

You know what's funny. I thought about wearing just the normal sweatshirt that I always wear, and then I went to the closet. I'm like, I'm gonna change it up, you know, because I think that my co-hosts will be really impressed. And I think I may have missed I think I may have missed the mark.

SPEAKER_01 1:54

You way overjudged us for sure.

SPEAKER_05 1:57

I did. I gave you I I gave you way too way too much credit. We have a lot to go over today, including a uh direct-to-consumer encounter that I personally had as a consumer. How about that? But first, have you guys had a good week so far?

SPEAKER_01 2:16

Amazing.

SPEAKER_05 2:17

This has become the highlight of my week, just so you know. So very excited to very excited to get this moving here. Um let's recap last week. Let's start there because last week I had brought up concerns about non-QM loans, seeing what I'm seeing, seeing the momentum in the space, seeing the overzealous nature of investors wanting to pay and pay very well for these loans. The the uh DSCR component with rental income. Here's a little summary of that conversation, then we're gonna get to some stats that just hit the tape, you know, literally hours ago.

SPEAKER_03 2:49

I don't think we're gonna get to a point where we have to worry about these loans the same way we have to worry about the subprime prices.

SPEAKER_05 2:55

That's that's I don't know how you can call it negligible. It's it's it's growing in a big way.

SPEAKER_01 3:00

It's not nearly as as scary as what could be happening on the FHA space. I think this is not going to be anywhere near what subprime was, but I do think that lenders need to be very cautious about the loans that they are offering in this non-QM space.

SPEAKER_05 3:15

Yeah, and I think uh we all we all agreed there, right? And I think Kobe, you followed up with a post of your own about uh the non-QM space, but then you know I'm curious to know if anything has changed from your perspective, seeing what we're looking at right now. This is a non-QM performance snapshot from April 2026 from DV01 research. Um, Aaron was kind enough to uh you can see I summarized this using I used AI, everybody, by the way. Just so you know, I'm admitting it, I used AI. Um, what stands out, Aaron, when when you look at this? And has your concern level at all risen, even one decibel?

SPEAKER_01 3:56

Um, you know, obviously delinquencies are climbing, which is is kind of why we started having that conversation to begin with. And so um, you know, the the thing that stands out to me is the kind of in the middle of the cure rates, because I've been watching this, and and as delinquencies have risen, we have in the past seen where subsequently cure rates or when they were able to bring the loans current, um, they improved. Seeing the cure rate fall, meaning that's fewer loans that are being brought current from the prior reporting cycle, that is definitely concerning to me. And so, you know, I think again, there are those non-QM loans that are just the non-traditional documentation loans. I think that those still are a very good book. But I think especially DSCR space, especially if you're if you're looking at the the um the near miss product, I think that those are definitely going to be challenged and we need to be watching it.

SPEAKER_05 4:50

Kobe, roughly one in 14 non-QM loans is in some form of trouble. Impairments at 7.3%. You know, one thing I love about you, it's probably too early for you to make this call, is you're always willing. And I try, this is like if I, if someone said, What has Kobe taught you as a friend? It's to be open-minded and to be willing to pivot and change and alter as you get more data. So when you see this, any elevated concern on your on your part with how this is trending?

SPEAKER_04 5:20

Um, elevated concern, no, but it did, it did, as you uh, as you pointed out, it opened up that there's some nuance here that we should be addressing, which is first of all, the curate. We'll talk about that for a second. The curate is also a function of the macroeconomic picture. It's a function of uh what are interest rates in order to refi out of a property. Um, can you sell the property? Those are those are things that from a macro level, and and the curates on the uh conventional loans have also cratered as a result of the economic conditions. So I think there's a macro element there that that that is at play that is not necessarily speaking to the effectiveness of these loans or the performance of these loans. So we could see that change, and I think we will if we get some lower rates and a little bit more movement. Um, what I did notice in these numbers that that did kind of open my eyes a little bit is that the the marginal loans, the ones that are the no-doc, the the stated income or whatever, whatever we're doing on the bleeding edge of the non-QM or the non-agency, um, as Jen McGuinness called it on a MBA call that I was on this week, and I and I love that. Let's call it non-agency, not non-QM. Um the the loans that have the the most amount of opportunities for fraudulent statements or for um stated income bank statement loans, whatever, whatever somebody can do to get a loan on terms that are favorable that they don't actually deserve, that's where the problem is. That's where we had the problem uh back in the day with those loans. So I think those are a small, small part of non-QM or non-agency right now. And I think those are the ones that we should be watching out for. But we're still looking at delinquency rates that are half that of FHA. And Aaron, you pointed out that you were more concerned about FHA, and she's right to be. Uh, it's a much bigger piece of the business, and the delinquency rates are 2x. So um, I still think we're we're not in a point to be uh clutching our pearls over these loans, but we should be paying attention to them for sure.

SPEAKER_05 7:03

Yeah, I mean, I'll just continue to point out the environment that we're in right now. It's getting tough for people out there, and rents are declining in a lot of areas. So to think that this is going to get better when the majority of these loans, majority meaning more than 50%, are tied to rental income and an expected rental income, not just this year, but next year and the year after that. It just uh you'd add to that uh the homeowners insurance. You know, Kobe, another great post you made about affordability and mortgage payments this week. You've really been on fire, by the way. Your Lincoln is a must follow. Must follow, bro. You're literally fuego. Um do we uh do we expect tighter guidelines or we just we just uh may have a keener eye uh observing here, pay closer attention.

SPEAKER_01 7:49

I think I think it's too early to tell. I think we need to get through and and see what the next few months look like. Um if we start to if we see continued deterioration, yeah, I think on the margins we will see some changes, but I think it's too early to tell.

SPEAKER_05 8:02

Okay, excellent. All right, you guys ready to jump into this uh experience that I had with let's go well. So let me tell you a little story. All right, you guys like stories?

SPEAKER_06 8:14

Yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 8:15

Let me get my hot cocoa.

SPEAKER_05 8:17

I'm gonna tell you one. First, I'm gonna remove this slide. So uh I'm looking to potentially send my kid to public school in an area that we don't live in. So I just on a whim went around looking in my area for schools in my kids' district. As a consumer, by the way, as a customer, right? Other side of the table. Somehow landed on this website. This is the property that I was looking at, right? Pretty innocuous, innocent looking, little townhouse in the in the same district. I hit message agent. Okay, message agent, right? So you'd think you're expecting to message an agent, right? So up comes this message agent, very consistent. I'm about to message the agent. So I put my name, I put my email, I put my phone number, I hit go, thinking I'm gonna message the agent. But that's not what happened. What happened was I got six emails in less than 30 minutes, an immediate phone call, two text messages, and by the time it was all said and done, just three and a half hours later, three and a half days later, I had all these emails from Movoto. Uh Movoto is pretty big in the space. I mean, I think they're in the top five as far as uh, you know, web web traffic, and by all accounts, great company. I don't have anything to say about them. Uh bad. I've not seen anything uh bad out there, but the experience was really uh terrible for me. I I didn't understand what I had done, and I felt like it was extremely misleading. So as a consumer, I aired that in a post um Friday, I think it was, and I and I got kind of lit up from people saying you consented. Like what do you expect when when you consent? And, you know, a couple things to point out here, and then I'm gonna share just a little bit of uh, you know, some criticism and some suggestions as we try and end this particular part of the show on a positive note, right? Because the three of us are huge advocates for the industry. We're trying to make sure that the consumers have a great experience. We can't always make solid contact, but if we're gonna be the best that we can be, we've got to be open to constructive criticism, right? And to me, as a consumer, this is misleading. What Movoto is doing is misleading. Message agent, you put your info in, you expect to be messaging an agent, not going into some crazy lead funnel. Now, some might say, well, why don't you why don't you lead, why don't you read this? Even in the disclaimer, there's a big problem here. By entering my info and clicking submit below, I'm providing a signature and express written consent to receive marketing email calls, text including automatic telephone dialing system, generative AI, artificial or prerequisited, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right? So there's a lot, there's a lot to this that I have a problem with. And that's why I asked the question publicly, and I'd love to hear in the comments. And I'm and I'm okay to be wide open on this. Like if I'm not right, tell me I'm not right. Maybe I'm way too old school. Maybe go and submit are now the same thing. But to me, if submit, if you're gonna if you are going somewhere to message an agent, that's what you expect to do. If you're hitting go, you're expecting to do that action. If you hit submit, that means you're you're submitting and then you're wide open. What are your thoughts on this? Aaron, you can go first.

SPEAKER_01 11:44

I mean, I I just cannot stand the constant like pinging, phone ringing, emails. To me, it's almost similar to why we beat trigger leads, is because the way that they were communicating to consumers, constantly calling, constantly emailing, all of that, it was abusive and predatory, right? So this to me is similar to a trigger lead situation where where they're just coming and just absolutely spamming the crap out of you. This would make me absolutely not want to do business with this company at all.

SPEAKER_04 12:16

Spoils my blood.

SPEAKER_01 12:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 12:19

We've uh we've we've had to come so far in the last 15, 16 years to restore trust. We still have a trust problem. We still know that most, and we know this from the first home IQ, next gen reports, we know that most customers don't trust our industry. And we've talked about on this show the idea that we need to be uber transparent, over the top, beyond reproach, with our customers to win their trust. We need to be meeting them where they are. We need to be understanding what their issues are, the trauma that the Gen Zers have from the great recession days. By these kinds of actions where we're putting a whole bunch of fine print there in order to unleash holy hell on a customer with this kind of barrage, not to mention the AI robot voice that called you and wouldn't let you off the phone five. They deny that.

SPEAKER_05 13:08

By the way, they deny that. I am gonna share a little a little piece of that here.

SPEAKER_04 13:11

Um even if but if that person was real, the way that they talk to you is still unacceptable.

SPEAKER_01 13:17

Correct.

SPEAKER_04 13:17

So so no matter what, I I think it wasn't real. That's my opinion. But even if it was, that was unacceptable.

SPEAKER_05 13:23

That's my opinion too, right? And by the way, it's okay. We all expect to have agentic on the front. And personally, just so you know, everyone, just be honest. I I feel like the biggest opportunity for agentic AI is on the front end of the lead funnel. I love it. I think it's I think it's the most, and I've told Joe Wheeler this at Total Expert. I think it's the most underutilized, undervalued part of the process. So if it's an AI agent, cool, whatever, right? So, so in this call, and I'm not, um, I want to be sensitive uh to the agent name, right? So I'm not gonna share that here. Um, but this was a call that uh we both consented to be recorded in the beginning. And I took the call from Virginia where there is no two-way consent. So all I'm gonna do here is be very constructive, and I'm just gonna play an excerpt from this call because I I I it was so genuine. Like I was not comfortable. You can tell by the way I'm talking right now, you can tell by the story that I'm telling that this is very sincere. I I was a consumer on this call with an agent, and I had an issue with the with the conversation, and I tried to get off. I said I'm not comfortable. I didn't realize I hit submit. Can I basically can I go now? And the agent just steamrolled me. I mean, I almost want them to tell me it was AI to say, hey, we're gonna make a tweak here and there, but I'm gonna I'm gonna pull this up and I'd love some comments in the totally fine. So I'm gonna make sure it starts at the beginning. Here we go. Go go is not totally fine. Yeah. Oh, I'm sorry, go ahead. Well, I was just saying that go go go and submit are two different things. I I guess I hit submit, huh?

SPEAKER_00 15:04

Yeah. But that's okay. One thing I wanted to assure you is some people take six months to a year to get a property, so there's no pressure at all. Uh they're only here to answer your questions.

unknown 15:14

Uh, whatever you're ready that is, will you also be selling or just buying for now?

SPEAKER_05 15:18

Yeah, I'm not qu I'm not quite sure. Um I'm gonna just take a few minutes to think about this.

SPEAKER_00 15:26

Okay, um, let me ask you this.

unknown 15:28

Were you looking around to potentially buy in the future, or were you looking more towards rent it in the future?

SPEAKER_05 15:34

No, what are you most comfortable with? Um I'm actually not sure. I didn't expect this call so quickly. So uh I think I'm gonna go now.

SPEAKER_00 15:42

Well, let me put it from that perspective. If you were able to find a property that didn't make sense to you financially, I mean you really love that property. Would you entertain possibly buying a home?

SPEAKER_05 15:52

I mean, it's just I mean, can we just talk about this experience? Can we just talk about this experience for a minute, please? Like, like, like, like people at people at this company, this is not a personal thing. Please don't make it personal. There's some people on my on my threads talking about, you know, oh, well, we're gonna get, you know, a lawsuit together for what? For being a concerned client and an advocate for the industry? Is that who you want to be? Is that what you want us to be spreading? I'm simply saying that as someone that was on this end of the transaction as a true consumer, not some a-hole mortgage loudmouth that was looking for trouble. I got dumped into the situation and I felt like I was misled.

SPEAKER_01 16:32

No, go ahead, Kobe.

SPEAKER_04 16:33

Well, you know, I I I don't I don't think we need to make this about this company specifically. I think the statement we need to make is is this where we want our industry to go?

SPEAKER_03 16:41

Correct.

SPEAKER_04 16:41

Is this how, you know, and and there are other companies we you know, we know stories, and I'm not gonna name them by name right now because uh, you know, I don't want to create a bloodbath, but there are companies that brag about having their agentic AI bots call last November when rates dipped to capture a bunch of refi business, and they bragged about how many brute force calls were made, hundreds of thousands in a day. Um, is that really where we want to go? Um, and and and there's a lawsuit that was uh was put forth in February. I know the plaintiff's name was Lamb, and I forget which mortgage company, don't have to name them, but claiming that the AI uh called him saying they were initiating a callback when the guy never called them, didn't disclose that they were AI. He was living in a state where they were required to do so. It was a TCPA violation. If this is where we're going as an industry, not only will it further erode the trust that we've worked so hard to rebuild with customers, but there's going to be massive, and I'm talking about seven and eight-figure lawsuits stemming from this if it's not done the right way. Um, and I just feel like, you know, there's letter of the law and spirit of the law. And yeah, you can have a whole bunch of fine print inviting people to click go or submit or whatever, but the customer experience is everything right now. We know that. That that's the whole play of the mortgage industry is figuring out how do we get a seamless customer experience. Is this really how we want it to begin?

SPEAKER_01 17:53

Well, and if you take it, take take the company at their word that this was a human being, like this is the way they're training their their sales agents. Like, so so then she's following like a very real script, right? Like that this is how they train, that we need to be talking and forcing consumers and not letting them off the phone and pressuring them. That is absolutely worse to Greg's point. That's worse than if it was AI to me. Like I just, I just refuse to believe that this is how we would train real people because we do not want to be abusive at all. And if I was, you know, in Greg's spot, if I was just a consumer, if I'm a first-time homebuyer and now all of a sudden I'm getting blown up, like what do I think about this industry that I'm now trying to go into? I'm just gonna be pressured and forced. We saw two episodes ago that the Stratmore survey that I showed that from 24 to 25, the percentage of consumers that want to speak to a human has actually gone up. And this is why, because they don't want to have to deal with this if this is AI.

SPEAKER_05 18:50

I asked the agent if it was a human being or AI, and the agent said it was a human being, at which point I asked, What's the weather like outside? And the agent responded, I don't know. I've not been outside all day. I work remotely.

SPEAKER_01 19:07

So do I.

SPEAKER_05 19:08

Oh, and I asked again. Yeah, I yeah, I asked again. So you can't tell me what the weather is like outside? No, no, really. No, really, I work remotely. So here's the thing you can you can try and bully. You know, we got people in the real estate space that are going into the mortgage space, right? And they have their own way of doing things. In this world, in this town, you got a lot of sheriffs, you got a lot of people that care an awful lot about the consumer, and you will be called for speeding. It's just gonna happen. Maybe it didn't happen in the real estate world, cool. But now you're on a different field with different people policing it. Okay. So my suggestion to that company or any other company is be very clear. We already know that there's a stigma around home ownership and the links in the chain in how people are communicated with. So if I say I'm not comfortable, if that, if that, and and by the way, someone from that company went to great lengths to say it was a real person. They've dealt with thousands and thousands of consumers. They've done a great job. Was that a great job when I truly was uncomfortable as a consumer? And I said, I'm not comfortable, or is that the moment where you show compassion and you actually listen and you say, I'm so sorry. Why aren't you comfortable? Maybe there's a better time to call. Don't just bulldoze me. Like, I want them to come out and say, you know what, it was a mistake. It was a system glitch that was AI, and we do care a lot about what we say to consumer. Like that would be cool, right? And we're all fallible, nobody's perfect here. This is not a lot. The best point here is Kobe's point. This is not about one company, this is about what the future might look like. And we have to make sure as we step foot into this direct-to-consumer world, back into this direct-to-consumer world, we don't regress. We need to progress. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 20:52

And that's we don't put it ourselves, someone else will.

SPEAKER_05 20:55

Yeah. And we've seen that before. It starts with listening. Any other comments on this? Did you get a good deal on the townhouse?

SPEAKER_01 21:01

Yeah, I saw it was pending.

SPEAKER_05 21:04

That's not my deal. No.

unknown 21:06

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 21:07

Um, I'm actually, truth be told, I I I'm really interested in the house, but but uh, and I want to click a button to ask what does this mean, right? It doesn't say under contract. I mean, I I guess being in the business for a long time, it seems to me like you just said, that it's that they're in some kind of a contract stage, right? I want to ask, but I don't want to hit the button again because I don't know where that's gonna lead. I would say to that company and any other company, just clean up the language, you know, make sure that everything connects, submit a submit, go isn't submit, and just be very clear and show emotions. If that is a true agent, you've got scripts. It's a total showstopper when a client says, I'm not comfortable, okay? That's 101. You stop what you're doing, you stop right there in your tracks. Yeah. Let's do it. You can't be any more clear about that. Let's do better. Let's do better. All right. We can uh we can move on now and we can talk about some other things, starting with a topic. That Kobe has brought to the table. That's EloComp. Kobe, take it away. Did I bring Elo Comp to the table? I think you did. Yeah. You or Aaron. It wasn't me, was it? I think it was you.

SPEAKER_01 22:09

I think I can go back to that text thread.

SPEAKER_05 22:11

Pretty sure it was you. Don't don't do that. I think I'm too steamy. I'm in my I'm I'm in my restaurant shirt, or I don't know, maybe a jail jailhouse shirt. I don't know what it is.

SPEAKER_01 22:21

Calamari. I I don't know.

SPEAKER_05 22:23

Do you remember the context in which the LOComp conversation came up?

SPEAKER_04 22:27

Yeah, there's a couple of things. I mean, you know, LOComp is something that the uh the MBA is actively trying to reform with the CFPB. Um, we're not sure if the CFPB has the bandwidth to take that on. It's not looking like they do. Um, but the executive order that came out from the administration was we need to make the home buying process in general, and I'm paraphrasing right now, we need to make it more accessible and more affordable. And so the NBA pushed back on on that, using that lever to say, hey, there's some things we can fix that can make this a more accessible and more affordable industry. And that's LOCOMP. And it's uh pushing back on some of the um the uh the trid reforms and and some of the ability to repay, I think, and and making it you know just uh a little bit better. There's a lot of compliance issues that we're faced with that are not necessarily beneficial to the consumer. So if you stack that on top of the LOComp, that's where the MBA went to the CFPB to say, let's address these. And there were three things. I know it was LOComp Trid, and there was one other thing. Regx, what was it?

SPEAKER_01 23:22

Regex. RegX, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 23:24

So they they were things that said, hey, these are not necessarily things that benefit the consumer, and we can attack these things and we can make this a more approachable, um, a more approachable acquisition cost for the consumer to buy a home. Um, EloComp, you know, has been, and of course, the NAMB pushed back on it because LOComp that's reformed on the retail side um pushes back on the advantage that the brokers have.

SPEAKER_02 23:45

Right.

SPEAKER_04 23:45

So so there's uh there's some structural things that we can do on the LOComp side to level the playing field, particularly when it comes to like the HFA programs and the uh and the DPA programs that are lower margin that that we could do more of for first-time buyers that a lot of mortgage companies shy away from. But there was also the broader question about are we paying loan officers too much in general? We we know, for example, that LO compensation is indexed to the loan amount. And we know that the average LO compensation right now per loan is somewhere around $320 or $3,300. That's the average commission. 2010, it was 50% of that. And that's directly correlated to loan sizes being twice what they were in 2010 because of home prices being larger or being higher. So are we paying too much? Is is uh is that affecting ultimately the profitability of the company? If the average BIPS that a loan officer is making is somewhere between 87 and 100 on a deal and the mortgage company is making 16 or 17, is it fair that the loan officer is making 6x than the mortgage company itself? Uh, and are we setting ourselves up for failure if we don't address this both uh from a global standpoint of how much is the right amount and from the standpoint of can we be more creative and more effective with how loan officers are paid to make it a better experience for the consumer?

SPEAKER_05 24:58

So those are the two for a guy that didn't bring it up, you had a lot to say. Very impressive. Well, I I I was ready. 85 bips, 85 to 88 to 90 bips is where most companies are landing on comp. So the question is do we keep doing this? Here's your shelf gen, here's your branch, here's your this, here's your that, here's your builder, here's the or do we just call it like we see it and as an industry have a come to Jesus moment and say, look, the way this works in this environment is we are like let's let's just lay it all on the table. This is what you're averaging anyway. Let's just call it that. That way we don't have to go back and forth. Aaron, your thoughts. I mean, you're you're running a uh an amazing IMB as the COO of Interlink. Like, what do you got? How do you guys think about this?

SPEAKER_01 25:40

Yeah, I mean, here's the thing is I think comp should be a if comp is a is a reflection of the value that you bring to the organization. And and that value is derived based on what type of competitive market am I in? What are the complexity of the files that I'm bringing in, right? And so to me, I Kobe hit it on the head. We're whatever any company wants to do within their own market, with their in their own loan officer to set comp, but the only reason we're even having this conversation is because we have these LO comp rules, or like the only industry in the country that says you have to fix your comp here and gives absolutely no room for negotiation or being able to reflect to markets that are have different competitive nature, markets that have different complexity of products, different variety of products. And so that's why I'm proud to be part of the Mortgage Bankers Association that is actively going after LOCOMP reform because we should be able to not have to say across the board we're all going to do $1,000 alone, or across the board, we're all gonna do 85 basis points. It should be how normal incentive compensation is set, which is a reflection of the value that you bring to that organization and that decision and equation should be made between the loan officer and the company.

SPEAKER_05 26:54

Yeah, well said. All right, Kobe. I'm positive you brought this up. Now you didn't make this slide, I made it. It's a very busy chat GPT slide. Uh now I paraphrased what you said. You had we had we were having a conversation, we do our our pre-production meeting, and we were talking about brokers and lenders and cross-functionality and blending. And why did you bring this topic up? And and what do you want us to talk about? I'm still trying to figure out what's going on here.

SPEAKER_01 27:23

So busy, it's like a used car commercial.

SPEAKER_04 27:27

Where do I start on that?

SPEAKER_05 27:29

Well, no, no, we'll take we'll take it off. I mean, I just you know, I threw it in GPT.

SPEAKER_04 27:32

Are you talking about are you talking about the broader platform conversation? Okay, yeah. So so you know, last week, I think it was the end of last week, there was a story in National Mortgage News about Nexa acquiring Copper Ridge Ventures, which is a holding company for JVs. And of course, as soon as Nexa does anything, everybody from the rafters starts to shout, are they retail? Are they broker? Which one are they? And they make them kind of defend their position and who they are and define themselves in a certain channel. And the post that I put out that day was here, Nexa's done yet another thing and they've expanded their platform. At what point do we stop asking the question of are they retail or are they broker? And do we start asking, you know, does the future of mortgage look different? Is it is it more of a platform where there are multiple channels and there's multiple ways for a loan officer or a real estate company or a JV to plug into an existing infrastructure and manufacture production? And I think that it speaks to the broader question of what do we look like in five years? What do we look like in 10 years? Every week we come on the show and we talk about another element of profitability in the mortgage business, and we see that profitability quarter after quarter shrinking. It's gone from 21 basis points to 17 basis points to 16 basis points. And yes, 76% of companies are still profitable, but that profit margin is this thin. And if we don't start thinking about what we look like in five or 10 years and how we manufacture loans in a different way, and yeah, AI is part of that. But what, you know, do we do we really need to keep defining the broker channel versus the retail channel? Can we gain more efficiencies if we start thinking about things more broadly? Um, and what do things actually look like?

SPEAKER_01 29:04

Well, I mean, I think it's uh, you know, natural progression. It's broker to banker. I mean, that's that's what it is, right? But as we're seeing consolidation, more and more consolidation, I think we're gonna absolutely start to see changing business models, trying to gap capture market share as much as you can because we're just gonna see bigger and bigger players come on.

SPEAKER_04 29:22

But that progression you're talking about, that's what it historically has been. You start out as a broker, you do enough volume, start to get a warehouse line, you do non-delegated, and then you then ultimately you hire processors and underwriters and you're doing the whole thing. That has been the traditional path.

SPEAKER_02 29:34

Correct.

SPEAKER_04 29:35

What what I'm what I'm asking, and what I asked in my post, is does that traditional path, is that what's going what it's still going to look like in 10 years from now? Or are we going to see uh a more of the platform model where you have the different routes that a loan officer can come in and do business? Are you going to incentivize them for servicing, you know, even though we know that there's holes in that? But are you going to have a non-delegated channel, a broker channel, a full retail channel? Can you have all of those things existing at the same time and be much more diverse and perhaps make more money than what the traditional path has been?

SPEAKER_01 30:07

I think you have to just survive.

SPEAKER_05 30:09

Well, some do. So that's been happening for a long time. Some companies do have that value proposition of sharing servicing. Some companies do lean heavily on lending, but then they allow you the opportunity to broker. What's interesting around the brokers are better movement is there was a time where there were staunch uh advocates of the broker channel coming on all platforms to say that the the line of demarcation is if you have a warehouse line, you're not a broker. But now it seems as though the majority of the brokers that are doing any number in anything in numbers, they've got warehouse lines. So what really is the difference at this point, other than the fact that the brokers are capped and the lenders aren't in terms of revenue, Kobe?

SPEAKER_04 30:56

Yeah, you know, I I I think it's it it almost feels like whenever I hear the, you know, are you are you a broker or are you a banker? When someone gets that warehouse line, it's almost like retail having their day in the sun. Like, you know, you you you wanted to differentiate, oh well, and now you're one of us. So, you know, you're no longer, you know, Andy Harris is one of them. You know, as soon as anybody even, you know, dials the phone number for an account exec at a warehouse line, uh, he's like, well, you know, you're no longer one of us. Now you're retail. Um I think it's fading. That's fading though. That's fading. Yeah, I and I think it should sunset, and I think it should fade. And I think we should be talking about things more broadly. And I mean, even the fact that even the fact that we have um the NAMB pushing back on the MBA for LOCOM perform because they don't want to lose their arbitrage advantage, um, you know, I think that's bad for the industry. I think I think we should think of ourselves more, you know, more nimble, more diverse. We need to be thinking, and that that was my post about non-QM too. We need to be thinking about what kind of different products we can offer. Uh, you know, we're we're we're clearly, we're clearly voluming ourselves into extinction because the more loans we do, uh, the the the higher the cost goes up and the and the shrinking of the margins, and that's going to put people out of business. There's that's the trajectory we're on right now. So if we don't change that, if we don't start to think about the industry differently and how we can provide more value to loan officers and through that, consumers, uh, we're gonna see that 76% number of profitable companies go down very rapidly. And obviously the consolidation will happen as a result.

SPEAKER_01 32:24

Yeah, and I think that's just it. Like we're in a we're currently in a in a phase where our entire ecosystem is rapidly changing. And I think that we can't expect things to operate the way that they always have been for that exact reason.

SPEAKER_05 32:36

Yeah, I I have a prediction to make here. I think that Rocket is gonna break the seal here as a you know broker platform that brings in true retail. Um I think they're gonna lean into I don't have any Intel, by the way, but I think that it makes sense for them with all with all the horsepower they have with leads, with all the servicing, you know, one in six loans and and everything else that they have, all the efficiencies, all the AI, they'll probably the lowest cost to produce out there, one of them anyway. Um it makes sense for them to look at the IMB space because that I mean that's billions and billions and billions of dollars. They can accept they can accelerate that timeline that uh that Jay and Varun talked to me about Jay Bray from Mr. Cooper and Varun Krishna from Rocket. I had them on about a month ago on my podcast one-on-one. And I asked Jay how long until you can confidently say you're bringing in every single lead that you have the power to bring in through all your channels. He told me 18 months. That's gotta drive that's gotta drive him sick. Like how do you accelerate that? There's one way. You go and you grab some I and Bs because you can't control the broker channel or hold them accountable the same or bank the same way as you can uh lenders, right? So if you go acquire an IMB and now those loan officers work for you, you can say to them, hey, when you get a lead, you need to call that within 30 seconds. But you can't say that to a broker, right? I mean you can say it to them and they'll find and it'll flush out in the results, but you can't, you know that Rocket loves to drill down on metrics.

SPEAKER_01 34:12

Well, I'd be interested to hear how I and B loan officers, if if they stick around to be a part of that model, like they can you can acquire the IMB, but that does that mean the loan officers are going to stick around?

SPEAKER_05 34:23

I think yeah, I unless something dramatically changes on the volume and the rate environment.

SPEAKER_04 34:31

Well, you also don't need a hundred percent buy-in. You don't need a hundred percent. If you buy an IMB, you don't need a hundred percent of those loan officers buying into your, you know, if you don't pick up the phone right away, you lose the lead. You just need a certain percentage of them that you control. And if that's five percent or ten percent, that's great. You've got your control and the rest go out and do the business the way they've always done it. So I absolutely the play they should make, and I think they will.

SPEAKER_05 34:52

Well, the X factor, Aaron, is that you can you've got a feather in your cap for recruiting in that model that you don't have, that you don't have, and that I don't necessarily have at NFM either. I'm not I'm not saying you don't have it, I'm just saying as IMBs that aren't tethered to um a company that has yeah, massive, you know, like a lead uh a lead machine. Um now if if you're if you're there, you can say to loan officers and branch managers that your world's not gonna change at all. It's gonna be the same, the economies are gonna be a little bit better, right? But now we're gonna actually give you leads. We're gonna pay a little less on them, but you're gonna be able to build your business in a in a in a very intentional different way. And that book belongs to you when people uh end up refinancing and stuff. So it is an interesting, um, interesting time in our in our industry. I I'm not sure, Kobe, that in five or ten years, uh how much different it's gonna look. I think that's a conversation for another day. Certainly something we all spend a lot of time thinking about.

SPEAKER_04 35:50

Well, we've got one of our we've got one of our topics today that actually might, you know, might lead right into that and and change the landscape. I don't know if it's next or coming up, but um, you know, the the the whole IMB and and Basel III and what that means for IMBs and bank relationships, that could change the landscape in five, 10 years. There's a lot of things that could happen. A lot of things that will happen.

SPEAKER_01 36:07

Yeah, absolutely. It you know, and if we can you want to jump right into that one?

SPEAKER_05 36:10

Yeah, Aaron, you're you're the lead on this.

SPEAKER_01 36:12

Yeah, I mean, I thought this was a really interesting article that I saw this week about, you know, would the changes to Basel III potentially make IMBs purchasers of banks? And no, I don't think, you know, on on the whole, that's not going to happen. But I think there are some companies, and I think Rocket being one of them, where potentially that could make sense. You have access to, you know, better access to funds. You've got the federal home loan bank, you know, from a licensing regulatory perspective, what does that look like? Does that make your lives any easier? And so I think that that there could be a play where potentially a freedom, you know, does Stan want to be a bank? Seems natural for him too, right? And so, you know, I think it's a it's a really, really interesting play and proposition where where I don't think, you know, Interlink is tomorrow going to go want to be a bank because we could potentially get better MSR values, right? But I think there's a lot of these larger IMBs aggregators. So you go from broker to banker to depository, right? Is it just a new extension of of the growth model and and where that goes? And I'm wondering, you know, the Penny Mac Senlar acquisition, you know, as part of that, Senlar is getting rid of their bank charter. And I'm wondering if if Penny Mac is, you know, if that if they're regretting that or if they're they're rethinking that now with potential changes with Basil and if that could have benefited Penny Mac. So I, you know, I'm I'm interested to I'm interested in in if if they've had a change of heart on that.

SPEAKER_05 37:31

Aaron, this is not an area that I'm an expert in. I know maybe enough to be dangerous. So, you know, if if we if you can break this down in a very rudimentary way for for everyone out there, because some may think to themselves, I thought we, I thought we killed Basel. Like I thought that the all the things we didn't want ended up not happening. Why are we, why are we back at the table? And why as IMB should we care?

SPEAKER_01 37:53

Yeah. So, you know, so Basel III, the, you know, quote unquote endgame, the the proposal is out there. I think the final commentary is due next month in a few weeks. Uh, Mortgage Bankers Association is all over it. I know that Bob's been talking about it, testifying about it. They're working on their written responses to it. But basically, you know, it's changing the way capital rules are are working for bank banks, um, specifically the one that a couple of them that are important. Um, one is on the MSR, the risk weighting on MSRs. Um, they have it at 250%, which is basically, you know, been it's been really, really bad and negative for banks. And so they're saying the proposal basically said, what should the risk weighting be? And I know MBA is coming out and saying it should be moved down to 100%, which is significantly more favorable for holding those assets on your books. And so um, you know, now if if holding MSRs has a more favorable capital weighting, the the article basically just said, okay, now would it make more sense for IMBs to try to go be banks, be depositories? That could help, you know, make it easier to make that conversion to being a depository, which that also opens you up to different lines of access. You can bring checking accounts, you can have a more complete loan. Um, there's a couple, you know, several other um, you know, items with with the Basel III reforms as well, in terms of lowering risk weightings for loans with MI, in terms of um of warehouse banks. And I think that's good for for IMBs, even if you're not talking about um uh if you're not talking about IMBs buying banks, this could this could ultimately help IMBs with bringing banks back into warehouse lending. There's been a lot of consolidation there. So could we maybe have more banks come competing for our business, giving us more favorable terms? Uh, could we have banks come back into the aggregator space? Can we get a Wells Fargo back buying more loans? Get Chase buying more loans, that kind of thing. And so I think some of these changes that that have been announced, and there's a lot of a lot of material out there that you can do if you want to do a deep dive on it. But I think there's a lot of really good opportunities here to help IMBs, regardless of whether or not they try to be a big boy and buy a bank.

SPEAKER_05 39:59

That's amazing.

SPEAKER_04 40:01

Yeah, I have a question for Aaron on this. So if the other the other the way that it might negatively impact is is with more competition with MSRs. So wouldn't that put some of the pressure on a Rocket or a Penny Mac to want to get involved in the banking side so that they can kind of achieve those efficiencies as well?

SPEAKER_01 40:16

Yeah, no, absolutely. And that's why Rocket is is number one on my list for it. And um, I and and I'm I'm really curious as to what the you know, what the conversations are at Penny Mac about that Sendlar charter.

SPEAKER_05 40:29

Very interesting.

SPEAKER_04 40:30

Anything else on this? Yeah, I mean, the the just you know, a reference to the post I wrote about, you know, how the the moat is going to be um the the non-agency products. Uh and while there's certainly some some cause to be concerned about where some of those are going, um, that's the part of the industry that I think the banks are never going to touch, even if they do decide, they're gonna get back into the servicing. But if they do decide to get back in mass into the into originating beyond just their own customers, which is what they're doing now, uh, they're gonna want to be still doing jumbo loans and and portfolio lending. They're not gonna want to get into the non-agency stuff. So that's an opportunity to expand. That's that's that's I think another moat that we need to look at if you're IMBs or brokers against uh the banks potentially coming back into the business.

SPEAKER_05 41:10

With the diminishing pie, though, why why should an IMB welcome uh banks getting into origination? I know we've talked about this before, but uh that's a some people haven't heard us talk about this. So if you're out there listening, you're probably thinking thinking what I'm thinking like it's already uh dogfight out there. We're already making less, doing less, less opportunities out there, and all of a sudden now we've got this possibility that banks would want to get back into mortgage when we know they just go in and out whenever they want to. That's not gonna change. So I I love I love the things that you said, Aaron. It's so insightful to think about um that potentially there might be some better warehouse facility uh lines, that maybe there would be a competition, a race to the bottom. It could be cheaper for everybody. Um, all that maybe that the banks will there'll be a race to pay up more for MSRs, like all that is really positive. But as an IMB, you don't keep your doors open, you don't keep your lights on unless you're originating loans. Kobe, why should we welcome banks into that space? Is there not enough competition out there already?

SPEAKER_04 42:13

There's plenty of competition. Um, you're looking at it though from a static market standpoint. If the market stays static and there's no new entrance and we're not building more homes and we're not creating more vehicles for people to own homes, then yeah, obviously you want less competition. But more competition equals more innovation, equals better, more people coming into the market potentially. The banks will probably do loans that the IMBs don't want to do. The banks will are more likely to do down payment assistance and first-time buyer loans where the IMBs, it's not as profitable for them, especially if we don't reform LOComp. So there's the possibility that new entrants into the market could grow the whole pie. And then there's more homeowners, there's more opportunities for refinances, and more there's more transactions happening. I think if you look at it from that standpoint, we should welcome them.

SPEAKER_05 42:55

But historically, Aaron banks like the portfolio things that IMBs can't get their hands on.

SPEAKER_06 43:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 43:00

So that that makes it even that makes it like uh, you know, double jeopardy. It's like a like a double threat. Yeah, you know, but I they're still doing those loans though.

SPEAKER_01 43:10

Yeah, they're yeah, they're still doing those. And and and I think the fact that there's still a ton of reputational risk in in mortgage origination for banks. Um, you know, I still think that the that if I'm a bank, the smart play for me is is buying the MSRs, doing the warehouse banks, eliminating having all that market risk, the volatility, the reputation risk. And so I don't, I I could could be wrong. I'm wrong every freaking day, but you know, I just don't see the banks coming back to origination like on a large scale. I think there's far more opportunities for them to do it in other ways where they can benefit without exposing themselves to the risk that they just don't like. And, you know, you've got some of these big banks just coming out of their consent orders and they're not, I think, going to be eager to jump back into that. And and, you know, IMBs are IMBs are the ones who have been here through thick and thin, and we've continued to serve that, serve the markets well. And I think that we're gonna continue to be able to do so. And I think we can compete and And I think we compete on service and I think we can we can show that we truly are the ones who understand our communities.

SPEAKER_04 44:06

There's a thousand community banks out there. Each of you could buy one, one for Interlink, one for NFM.

SPEAKER_01 44:12

Listen, let's go.

SPEAKER_05 44:13

To me, community, you know, when I think of banks, I don't I don't put enough weight in the community bank aspect because that to me, I'm all for pouring into that more. I just think about the larger banks, right? That have all the clout and all the power, the JP Morgan's of the world, the Wells Fargo, Bank of America at one time. We saw what happened when things fell apart. But yeah, community banks, you know, you guys have brought me from, you know, this is what I love about this interaction that we have. You brought me from the complete left a little bit over the middle on this. I'm I'm I'm feeling it, and I appreciate um all of the insight on this topic in particular. Aaron, you're up again. Can you believe it? You're gonna you're bringing up the caboose here. Um great job here. Um you wrote an article here on the appraisal changes, and everybody stop what you're doing. Like this is a very, very big deal. Aaron educated me a couple of days ago on this, and it's a real showstopper.

SPEAKER_04 45:06

And what a great picture. In that I can I mean it's a very small thumbnail, but that looks like a really cool, great picture of you.

SPEAKER_01 45:12

Well, thank you. That was uh that we actually took that. My friend Dustin Pfluger's wife, shout out to Ashley. She uh she took that headshot for me at the annual convention. So I've had my prior headshot since 2021. So, you know, yeah, it's good.

SPEAKER_04 45:25

I like the off-the-shoulder action.

SPEAKER_01 45:27

Thank you. Thank you very much.

SPEAKER_04 45:28

What do you think? Greg, what do you think? Did we see you in an outfit like that next week?

SPEAKER_05 45:32

Uh it's very possible.

SPEAKER_04 45:34

Um, I mean, you went full blanket today. I think uh I think showing a little skin next week.

SPEAKER_05 45:38

I can't listen, I can't see that well, so I'm having a hard time here. I I looks like part of the shirt is missing though. Yeah, so I hope you find that wherever that went. I like that. I mean, are you really on hinge, Aaron?

SPEAKER_01 45:53

Um, okay, yeah. No, I started to do the profile and then I just can't do it because I I don't know how to write about myself. I'm not about to make I AI do it. And pictures where I think I look cute, people tell me I look dumb dumb. You know what?

SPEAKER_04 46:05

So what if you could recommend you put this article up as your as your bio? And maybe maybe an appraiser who's now got a little more time on his hands might uh listen.

SPEAKER_01 46:15

I spent 12 years with an appraiser. I'm done with that.

SPEAKER_05 46:18

Oh my goodness. No, yeah, the val the value didn't the value didn't hold up on that one.

SPEAKER_01 46:23

Yeah, correct. Yeah, yeah. I uh the the quality rating was not advertised.

SPEAKER_05 46:28

Um, back to business here because this is this is serious. Like this could really think that it's possible that a bunch of appraisers could be leaving the business as as a result of this.

SPEAKER_01 46:40

Yeah, I uh it's something I'm really concerned about, right? So this changed over to UAD 3.6. We have a brand new appraisal form coming uh later this year, and uh it's a big deal because it's one that's being kind of pushed on the appraisal industry from FHFA as part of their you know uniform mortgage data set that we in the industry in in mortgage have been dealing with for years, right? Aligning, making everything look alike, consistent, basically finding a way to like report data consistently. Um, and so this change is now coming for appraisers, and and a lot of them don't like that. It's requiring them to get completely new software, make investments in new software, completely learn a new form, completely change how they write reports. Um, and so you know, I'm hearing that you know, upwards of 10% of our appraisal stock who they're not exactly replenishing at a high rate anyway, um, that they may just completely opt out and either retire or just work in spaces where they're not having to do the new form. So portfolio lending, that type of thing. And so, you know, what happens if we lose 10% of our of our appraisers? I think we we've been, we've already been pushing them out for lack of a better word, with the the amount of waivers that we're doing, right? And the value acceptance and the PDRs and all of that. And so if we lose 10%, what does that mean? Um, and so, you know, I'm concerned about that and what what what that's gonna look like. Uh, we're clearly, just like I said earlier, we clearly are are undergoing massive shifts in all aspects of our ecosystem. And this is one of them. Um, so if you're a lender, like if you're not paying attention to this or you're not really focusing on it, you really need to be. Um, and chatting with with um some of my appraisal partners right now, I mean, I'm hearing that only 25% of the appraisers right now are ready are able to do the new form. And so if you're trying to convert now, you know, that means you have a much smaller pool of appraisers to to choose from, which means your appraisal fees are going up. So now I'm hearing it's also another $50 to $100 per report. So this is something that is affecting us. It's affecting costs at least right now. It's affecting our appraisal appraisal pool, which could impact service levels. So we just need to be paying attention to it. And if if you're not in your company right now, then you're you're behind the eight ball.

SPEAKER_05 48:53

So we had it during this discussion, we we had the conversation about the government getting more heavily involved in in this business, Aaron. So or Kobe. One of you guys want to touch on on that. And I think it really salent question is what is the appraisal industry look like in three years? Is there even an appraisal industry out there, or is this is most of this done through automation? Um, Sans the outliers.

SPEAKER_04 49:20

You know, I look, we live we live in an age of data. The data that we have, the data points that we have are overwhelming. Uh we look at just, you know, uh Fanny, how they underwrite a loan, 200 points of data. They're not even looking at the score, they're ingesting 200 different points of data about that borrower to make a decision. There is no reason on earth we should still be sending, and I know this might be an unpopular opinion, but there is no reason on earth. I mean, I guess there's some reason, but generally speaking, for most homes that we finance in this country, conventional at least, uh, we should be moving there to FHA. There's very little reason to send a guy out there with a tape measure and one of those rolling things and a digital camera that he's got to upload pictures later and send this 12-page report. This is the first step towards modernizing the appraisal process, uh, towards getting better data on housing in general that's that's less biased. Uh, not that there's a ton of bias, but anytime there's a human involved, there's there's bias. So I'm not making a some kind of broad claim that appraisers are.

SPEAKER_05 50:18

But there's also discrimination bias, too. If you ever talk to Nikki Bianca from Fifth Third Bank, that's a whole nother conversation.

SPEAKER_04 50:24

Yes, and that's why I didn't want to touch on that because there is a claim out there about, but I wasn't talking about discrimination bias. I was talking about just the human, human in the loop bias that happens. Um, so it in my opinion, this is a great first step towards, and we've tried it once. We had Fanny, you know, one, you know, day one certainty, and and we do have, you know, I don't know what the percentage is. You guys would know better as operators what the percentage of appraisal waivers are. It's it's getting better and better and higher and higher every single year. Um, this is the this is a step towards that. You know, if we if we lose appraisers as a result of this that are retiring out, you know, so be it. If they're if they want to adjust to other positions in the industry, we welcome them. But this is no disrespect to anybody who's in that profession, but this needs to be modernized. This is a great first step towards that. Um, I I think what a what a great step in the right direction for the customer experience. If every single one of these appraisals is some sort of automatic valuation where we're not waiting for somebody to come back, think about the cost savings. What is the average appraisal cost now? $700, $800. Um, so these are ways that we can make the mortgage industry more affordable for and more sustainable for the operators and more affordable for the entrants as as the consumers go. Um, so I'm I'm all in favor of this. Um, this this this deadline, I think it's what, is it November 2nd?

SPEAKER_01 51:41

Uh November 2nd for new submissions to UCDP.

SPEAKER_04 51:44

For new submissions. I mean, you know, is that gonna stay if if if there's you know 70% of the companies are not ready, are they gonna push that back? I mean, they have a history of doing that with other things. Um, TRID, I think was the one thing that I remember that had the hard and fast date that they didn't uh diverge from.

SPEAKER_01 51:59

No, they did.

SPEAKER_04 52:00

Did they? All right, yeah. So, you know, so I guess I guess they've never diverged from that. They've always they've always pushed back the date when they've realized, but you have to put a hard and fast date. You've got to put pressure on the industry to change. Um, and I I you know I'm I'm all for it.

SPEAKER_01 52:14

It's it's gonna be it's gonna be a rough, a rough transition because we we're still at a point where where we're not gonna have waivers on everything. And so for those of us who are in the space today, uh, regardless of what it looks like in the future, we've we've got to make sure we're we're prepared for it. Um, you know, I think there's always gonna be a place for appraisals. You're always gonna have portfolio, you're always gonna have potential value issues. And then there's also consumers who use the appraisal as a negotiating tool, right? I mean, I know there's times where they get a waiver and they still opt for a full appraisal because they think that they can use that value to negotiate. And so if we if we ultimately you know get rid of all residential appraisers, then how do consumers lose their ability to negotiate on that? Do they? What will be their route? And so I think there is still, there's still a lot to think through as we go through the next few years of what that appraisal industry is going to be like. And does it make consumers lose a negotiation ability?

SPEAKER_05 53:09

So lastly, US and Iran reach tentative deal, but Trump must still sign off. Um, this is a headline we should just touch on quickly uh as it relates to the mortgage business. Like what uh if if there is a settlement here and the war ends, uh obviously things are gonna change for the better, you would think, drastically in the mortgage industry. So I know you all welcome that, right? Lower gas prices potentially a falling bond. You know, unless too much damage has been done on the inflation front, obviously inflation's hot even without this. Um so we I guess we fit we cross our fingers that it's gonna come to an end here. Yeah, I don't know anything about this. I work from home.

SPEAKER_04 53:50

So I as you know, I work remotely.

SPEAKER_05 53:56

Um Aaron, do you want to put your hat on? What are you talking about? Backwards, Aaron. You want to put your hat on backwards? You have a hat there.

SPEAKER_04 54:03

Um yeah, look, you know, this has been it's you know, this is this is dragging on.

SPEAKER_05 54:08

Um, you know, as and the show, the show or the war or both.

SPEAKER_04 54:13

The uh the war. Get your blank my blanket back on here. Well, I mean, look, if if if the war doesn't end and oil prices go up, you know, how are you gonna heat your office? So you may need that blanket.

SPEAKER_05 54:24

Yeah, um my landlord's kicking me out, by the way. He he claims that I broke his condenser on the roof. 20 grand he said it cost him because I because I've got the only thermostat in the building, apparently. And I'm one of those people whose feet is they're constantly freezing. This is what happens when you get older, you two don't know yet. You're still south of 50. So I have this little space here, and he claims that it that the thermostat got confused and it sent some signal up to this $20,000 compressor. So he's he has kicked me out, he has given me notice. So I'm gonna have to redo this. Maybe I'll just put no surrender back here.

SPEAKER_01 54:58

Oh, yeah, there you go.

SPEAKER_05 54:59

What do you think? I like it. It could happen.

SPEAKER_01 55:02

I like the war ending. I like that. Let's let's let's all of it.

SPEAKER_05 55:06

All right. Well, it's been another great show, our third in a row. Are we gonna continue this? I mean, I know we said it was a three-week trial. I don't know. What do you think? You you're medium? Oh you going up? We going up, you going down? I don't know. Going up. I think we're going up. Any closing thoughts?

SPEAKER_04 55:25

Yeah, you know, I I've I've uh I'm really enjoying doing this. I'm really enjoying doing this with both of you. I just want to say it. Um, you know, Greg, you said it was the highlight of your week, and it's it's quickly become mine as well. Um, this is a lot of fun, and and it's uh it it's great to to do deep dives on some of the topics that both of you bring up and to get ready for the show. So I appreciate that. Um and uh, you know, I would love more audience participation. Tell us what you want us to talk about. You know, we we you know you know how to you know how to reach us. We're all over LinkedIn. You could find us, so we'd love to hear from you what you want to hear about and what you want us to talk about, and we're happy to do it.

SPEAKER_05 55:59

There are comments, you know, that we've not covered. Well, let's get a couple we have to do a better job covering these comments too. Yeah. Uh Suzanne Calda Caldera, kind of pimp like. I'm not sure what that means. Maybe that's because of the uh because of the blanket. Um get you like a pimp chalice. Uh okay, there's this one that's also from Suzanne. Uh, when you consent, you don't expect to be stalked like a psycho X. Go ahead. We've all had those facts for sure. Uh I guess this was on that. That conversation uh definitely got people fired up. Um let's see. All right. We have to thank Nyung Chu, too. She's pretty amazing.

SPEAKER_01 56:44

Oh, she's the best. We love her.

SPEAKER_04 56:46

She's the she's the glue. Best part of this.

SPEAKER_05 56:48

I like Drew's the best. You guys, Aaron, do you know Drew? I know you.

SPEAKER_01 56:51

I know. I need to know Drew.

SPEAKER_05 56:52

Yeah, he's uh he's a big wig at guild. He's a great guy. So down to earth. Yeah, we know. Uh Bill Dolly, your guy. I mean, this guy loves you. Another show.

SPEAKER_01 56:59

Bill Dolly's the best. Like this dude is legit. He is awesome. I love him. I'm so glad he's watching.

SPEAKER_05 57:04

I think at this point he may be on your payroll. I mean, this this is like your biggest fan.

SPEAKER_01 57:09

I'll take it.

SPEAKER_04 57:10

I mean, this could have that could have been that could have been directed to me.

SPEAKER_05 57:12

You don't know. True. All right. Uh, we will do this again all over on Thursday, a week from today. Looking forward to it. And Kobe, I think if nothing else, you learned your lesson today to not drop a topic in my lap and leave it to me to come up with a graphic. So may this week your your graphic game was probably just a straight F. I'm not even gonna call it a D minus. F. Very little, very little participation in the graphic department. So hopefully one and done there.

SPEAKER_04 57:36

Short week. Short week.

SPEAKER_05 57:38

I understand. You were you were out there saving the world. All right, everyone. Take care, enjoy the rest of your week. So long.

SPEAKER_02 57:46

No surrender on the show. We go toe to toe. What fail, what fails? Who gets the whole hot news, hot takes, raises?