should see value and gain benefit from NRMLA membership,” he says. Harmes says program innovations could lower the cost at origination and improve the percentage of applicants who can qualify. “That would be a good start,” he says. “There is also a good opportunity now, with the forward market being so slow, to recruit and educate more mortgage professionals to competently originate reverse or at the very least to recognize when a reverse mortgage is a good, sustainable solution for a particular senior homeowner.” The reverse mortgage professionals also say they benefit from sharing knowledge among industry peers. Scheper points out that technology, such as educational videos on YouTube or webinars that can be distributed on social media, helps him get the word out to his clients. Such efforts become increasingly commonplace as older generations become more tech-savvy, several observers say. “We’ve always taken a transparent, educational approach, and many of our reverse mortgage clients and their families are fairly savvy, technology-wise,” Freck says. “We also work with a number of financial planners who expect a great deal of detail.” Harmes evangelizes about how technology can help loan originators reach clients more effectively, especially with newer retirees being more tech-savvy than previous generations. For example, he uses videos and platforms, such as Loom and BombBomb, to create personalized content to share with clients. The videos are easy to create, and they allow people to review them repeatedly, saving everyone time. If they don’t understand something, they don’t have to call him but can watch the video to see if they missed key points. Customers also can forward the videos to financial advisers, children and others who want or need to be informed about the process, Harmes says. “If you sit down with them at the kitchen table and go through it in detail with them on a Thursday afternoon, Friday morning they’re calling you asking the same questions you answered on Thursday,” he says. “I send the initial benefits letter to the borrower with a video that they can open in their email. They watch those videos as many as seven times.” In California, “99 percent of my borrowers have the tech savvy to open up a BombBomb or Loom video and watch it,” he adds. “It has really improved my conversion ratio—taking the borrower from interest to application.” The technologies also free up a valuable resource—his time. “My schedule is under strain all the time,” Harmes says. “But I hardly ever get in my car anymore to go see a client because Loom and BombBomb are so effective.” Downey says outreach, including in-person seminars, meetings and webinars, to elder law attorneys, financial planners, accountants and their various professional organizations remains a go-to method of finding new clients. “I wish I could tell you and your audience that we have uncovered the ‘secret recipe’ to make reverse mortgages a mainstream product and have just been keeping it to ourselves,” he says. “The fact is, what we have found most productive is old-fashioned outreach to the financial advisory community.” Thomas A. Barstow, senior editor of Reverse Mortgage, is a writer and editor based in Pennsylvania. “There is also a good opportunity now, with the forward market being so slow, to recruit and educate more mortgage professionals to competently originate reverse or at the very least to recognize when a reverse mortgage is a good, sustainable solution for a particular senior homeowner.” —Scott Harmes, CRMP, national manager of C2 Reverse REVERSE MORTGAGE / JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2024 33
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