SPEAKER_03 0:00

What do you think Morgan Financial is best known for Bivard County?

SPEAKER_02 0:03

I look at us as a processometric-driven company, but that's the COO and me. The reality is that we're a 24-year company, veteran-owned, veteran operated, you know, veteran focused. So I'd like to think we're best known for VA loans. We can do them faster than just about anybody. You know, we're very consistent with that. We watch out for the veterans' best interest, even if it's not in our best interest. I live by the public's principle. You can call it the long doggers principle, is that if I do a loan for you, Morgan Financial, I represent, I don't want to have to hide from you when I see you at long doggers or public's because I'm gonna see you. Not because I'm worried about what you're gonna say. We want to do the right thing when no one's looking. So I like to think we're known for our professionalism, our VA loans, and our integrity.

SPEAKER_05 0:45

I always go back to our vision statement, which is creating an environment for others to prosper, because a lot of people out there are doing things in this business to get themselves something or you know, getting a paycheck or building themselves, which is great. There's nothing wrong with that. But if you want exponential growth, you're gonna take care of the people around you. That's where you get all of that repeat business, and that's how you build a sustainable business.

SPEAKER_03 1:16

Welcome to the Studio 321 podcast, powered by Brightway, the Steve Trout agency. We're sitting down with real estate pros, insurance nerds, mortgage masterminds, and local legends who are making moves on the Space Coast. Hosted by the best insurance crew in the 321. At studio 321, it's all about community, real connections, and sharing a few laughs along the way. Strap in, let's launch into today's episode. Welcome back to Studio 321, powered by Brightway Insurance, the Steve Trout Agency. Today, Angela and I are joined by two guests from Morgan Financial, a mortgage lender that served Brebar County for 24 years. First up, Lindsay Shellhorn, business development team lead at Morgan Financial. Lindsay's spent the last seven years there, but she's actually got 21 years in sales and marketing, including nine as a small business owner, before she made the jump into mortgages. Today she leads business development, relationship marketing, and strategic partnerships for the company, and she's heavily involved in the local business community, including women who build. She's also a wife, a mom, and a huge autism advocate. Joining her is Joe Harris, Chief Operating Officer of Morgan Financial. Joe's been in the mortgage business for more than 20 years, and this August he'll hit 18 years at Morgan Financial. He joined as a loan officer back in 2008 when the company had three employees, and he's helped grow it at their highest point to 48 team members. These days, Joe oversees sales, marketing, operations, and technology for the company. And under his watch, Morgan Financial now averages 8.54 days from signed applications. That's freaking amazing. With almost 79% of loans approved within 10 days, Joe and his wife Robin have raised their four kids right here in Brevard County. He served on several local boards, including as Commodore of the EGali Yacht Club. Lindsay and Joe, welcome to the show. Pleasure having us. Yeah, that was fun though.

SPEAKER_04 3:24

That was fun. I know you guys are like a power duo for sure.

SPEAKER_03 3:31

So before we started recording, we were talking about podcasting and stuff like that. And I know that I, like I said, I I had always kind of looked up to you guys when I was starting this because I was seeing Joe's videos and your videos and stuff, and I was like, man, we could do this. Like, come on. You know what I mean? But I always looked up to you guys as kind of like the uh you were kind of first of the game, I felt like in Brevard, at least that I noticed. Yeah. You know?

SPEAKER_02 3:53

Yeah, but I got some catching up to do. Your technology in the studio looks great here.

SPEAKER_05 3:58

So I think it started a long time ago, though. It was uh Joe knows mortgages back in the day, I believe.

SPEAKER_03 4:04

You used to do a lot of like the talking head videos and stuff, and you kind of got into the social media content. Was that comfortable for you in the beginning, or is it something that you had to do?

SPEAKER_02 4:12

You know, it's one of those things you did out of necess necessity. You think that, oh, look, everyone else is doing this, or this is what they say to do to be relevant. But I mean, we'll get into it, but I don't I mean, content is probably the most important thing a founder or a business owner runner can do right now.

SPEAKER_03 4:26

Yeah. So, Lindsay, you spent 21 years in sales and marketing, including running your own business before ever getting into the mortgages.

SPEAKER_05 4:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 4:34

What made you take the leap into this industry?

SPEAKER_05 4:37

It's funny that you asked that because I get asked that often. Um, I've been in sales and marketing since right out of college. I worked for Suntry Country Club as the membership and marketing director there. Um I accidentally got that job, but it turned out very well. Um and then I worked for um a big company called Paychecks, outsourced payroll in HR. That was my first introduction to hardcore business-to-business sales, cold calling, knocking on doors, and that's tough. You only get paid when a deal closes. So that was kind of my first step into it. Um, and from there I started a business because I thought, why not when you're young, not married, no kids? Did that for about nine years. Uh, life took a different direction, and I sold the business. And I did not know a thing about mortgages at the time. I just knew the type of people that I wanted to surround myself with. And Joe and I actually used to be in a leads group a long time ago when I was working with paychecks. I said, I remember that guy that wears jackets and good ties all the time.

SPEAKER_00 5:36

Yeah, every day.

SPEAKER_05 5:37

Let me reach out to him. So I sent him a message and uh asked if we could grab lunch one day. And he said, you know, well, I'll never forget in our interview process, TR operations manager says, Well, what do you know about mortgages? I said, I have one. And yeah, I still got hired, but from there I kind of dove headfirst into mortgages. Again, I wasn't I didn't know much about it and I wasn't passionate about it. I was just passionate about people. And I knew how to grow business and I knew how to connect with people. I just needed to connect myself with the right kind of people. And since then I got my NMLS license, dove headfirst into learning everything about mortgages and construction and bivard business. So that's kind of full circle how it came about. That's impressive.

SPEAKER_03 6:20

But I too, like from a marketing perspective, it's almost like you don't have to know the product as good, right? Like it's really just about like connecting with people.

SPEAKER_05 6:31

You can learn product. Correct.

SPEAKER_03 6:33

You can learn product pretty quickly and easy, at least enough to fake it, right? Like you don't have to be a loan officer to go market, right? Like you can uh having those marketing skills is really just about connecting with people, I think, more so than anything. Because at the end of the day, nobody's really looking for you to come in and talk mortgages with them. They're looking for you to come in and talk about their kids and their lives and you know how you can help each other. You know what I mean? Like it's a um I think that's the cool thing about marketing, and I think that's the big thing. Like people get so worried, they're like that they might get asked a question they don't know an answer to, right? But like for you, like you probably had the confidence to know you have a team behind you, and if you don't know the answer, you're gonna find out.

SPEAKER_05 7:14

That's it. And that's why we got licensed. All of our all of our marketing team, our business development team had to be licensed because if we're going out and connecting with people and they ask business related questions, you need to be knowledgeable. But you hit the nail on the head when you said most people don't want to talk about mortgages. So you connect with them first, and then what's important to them, most of the time, they're small business owners as real estate agents and insurance agents. So they say you eventually, as long as you care about them, you'll say, So how's business? And they say, I'm struggling with this or I'm struggling with that. You can say, Hey, have you thought about this? Yeah. Uh it's about the relationships for sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:48

Yeah. I mean, she is licensed, but you know, if there's an issue with a loan or a loan-related question, it just goes right to the loan officer anyway. So it's very easy for the Trevor Burrus.

SPEAKER_05 7:57

Yeah, you do not want me structuring loans. I'm gonna call Mary, I'm gonna call Shannon, I'm gonna call my my loan officers at the office. They are the ones I'm a big golfer, so I always say it's my job to grab the ball, to put it on the tee, and to hand the loan officer a nine-iron or seven iron. From then on, that's the relationship. Yeah, I like that. Just meeting people.

SPEAKER_03 8:15

When you guys sit down and you're talking about marketing strategy and what your plan is for the year and stuff, like what are what are your goals, I guess, from a marketing perspective, or what do you think is most important for you guys right now?

SPEAKER_05 8:26

I mean, for us, we've got the we've got the inside and the outside. So marketing is not just one blanket topic. It's it's two things there's inside and outside. It's kind of boots on the ground, some relationship building, but there's also what I have to divert everything to Joe for, which is the technical side of it, the content, the automations, the the processes and the systems. And you know, you're you're only as good as the conversation and the follow-up that you have. So you can market to people all day, boots on the ground, but if you're not following up on the back end.

SPEAKER_02 8:56

Well, I I look at marketing, you know, my dad told me a long time ago if you're if your company isn't doing well, you either have a marketing problem problem or a product problem. We don't have a product problem. We put together loans better. I mean, we have the customers love us, you know, over 400 five-star Google reviews. I mean, we're enjoying it. But if you have, if you if you don't have every client you want, it's because you have a marketing problem. Now, I I used to look at sales as more important than marketing, but they go hand in hand. You know, a good sales team benefits from marketing. But with a really good marketing team, sales get super easy. And so if the marketing is really doing their job, it sets it up for sales to knock it down. And but so marketing is really the emphasis. You know, good marketing, make sure people are aware of your brand.

SPEAKER_04 9:38

Yeah, I have to agree with that for sure.

SPEAKER_02 9:40

And then you make sure that the customer is taken care of time and time again. Then it then it starts a roll.

SPEAKER_03 9:45

Yeah, and as you grow in scale, too, it's like your salespeople are stuck in their chairs, and then your marketing kind of stops, right? And so you've got to kind of compartmentalize that a little bit, you know, and have a marketing person who is assisting the salespeople and their marketing efforts, right? And I'm sure that's probably how you're well.

SPEAKER_02 10:02

If your salespeople are stuck in their chair, you need more salespeople. You know, I mean they need to be stuck in their chair, but you never stop the marketing because you stop that marketing, you're not gonna feel those efforts for six to nine months.

SPEAKER_03 10:13

I can't be stuck in a chair all day.

SPEAKER_04 10:14

I mean, I like to say we're I like being out.

SPEAKER_03 10:16

I always say we're not really in the insurance business, we're in the relationship business. You know, we're in the lead gen business. It's uh it like what I wake up every day thinking about is lead generation and how you know how we're gonna get the phone to ring more, right? Because everything else kind of falls in place once that phone starts ringing.

SPEAKER_02 10:32

As long as you got a process that handles it when it comes in, then you're right.

SPEAKER_03 10:36

Oh yeah. You just grow it.

SPEAKER_04 10:37

The process is so important too, for sure.

SPEAKER_03 10:39

So, Joe, may I take us back? So uh from my my prep notes, you were in futures trading, high-end commercial carpet sales in LA. That sounds like fun. Um then a loan officer at countrywide before Morgan Financial. So all those that early career stuff, how does that tie into like how does that is has any of that prior knowledge helped you where you're at today? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:00

Well, you know, but right out of college, I was a futures and options trader. And I I will tell you, you think mortgage is a technical sale. That is a technical sale as license, uh series three license. I think they include it in the seven. Um, but you're you're you have to get the business kind of like you do in the mortgage business. And then when you get it, you have to know the aspects of trading futures and options. Very technical trade, very difficult. The thing I didn't like about it is that it was more of a casino than anything else. And no matter how good of a job you did, your client was probably gonna lose money. So for me, it's not a win-win, I'm out. And then I moved a transition to LA where I was in sales, uh high-end commercial carpet sales to casinos and hotels, where that was also a technical sale. I mean, you have to know the technical specs of carpet, where it fits, where it does in, applications, color. So you had to kind of use, you know, work with big design firms to get it spec'd out throughout the world. Very technical sales. So mortgage was easy. You know, when we transitioned to mortgage, it was all easy compared to that. And I I joke because mortgage is a complicated business. But you know, as far as dealing with people, you know, learning the technical, understanding all different aspects, it's you know, it's not relationships are important, but if you don't back it up with with with your production and your value add, then it's not gonna it's gonna be a one and done. And so we're in here for the long term. You know, mortgage financial 24 years here. We didn't get to be here for 24 years because we do a bad job.

SPEAKER_03 12:26

Yeah. We've survived some tough markets a long time.

SPEAKER_02 12:29

We've survived a couple tough markets. Yep. Yep.

SPEAKER_03 12:32

I it just popped in my head, but you guys had the the caboose there on US one. Yeah, right. And that's still like a symbol for you guys today, right? It's part of your logo. Yes today. It is. What does that mean? What did that mean for you guys? Was it hard to leave that, you know, with being there? And because it just seemed like that's what when you thought Oregon Financial, you thought about the train.

SPEAKER_02 12:51

Yeah, you know. Well, that was 2016. We were busting at the seams in there. I mean, before the booms, obviously. We were busting at the seams. We needed more space. So the Rockledge office came came up, and you know, I I remember talking to Dave, and and he's like, Well, that thing will fit 32 people, you're gonna be out of there before you know it. You know, Dave still handles the strategy strategic direction of the company. Um, I run the day-to-day, obviously. But you know, he's like, You're gonna bust out of there before you know it. I'm like, I don't know, man. I don't know. And then in like 2020, we were already busting at the scenes. And then when we bought the building over there on O'Galee, uh, we actually moved a bunch of people back into the caboose because we we didn't have enough space, you know. So things can roll quickly. But yeah, the caboose, you know, I know it has a special place for David and even me. That's where I started working there. I was there for I don't know, a couple five, six, seven, eight years. So it was a while.

SPEAKER_05 13:44

It kind of started all of our like marketing campaigns too. Everything is related around that train caboose, like our classes that we did for a long time called Keeping Your Business on Track. It was a play on the caboose and play on the train track.

SPEAKER_03 13:57

No, I listen, I love the way you guys built your brand around it. You know, because it was such a unique spot in Brevard County, right? And it was just a really cool, like you couldn't you can't drive down US one and not see it, right? Like it was just one of those kind of almost like a landmark after a while.

SPEAKER_05 14:10

Call your clients and say, Hey, come meet in the caboose. Can't miss it.

SPEAKER_02 14:13

And the caboose had symbolism. I mean, you're the caboose was meant as like a lookout tower and making sure everything went well. And you know, we kind of adopted some of the things.

SPEAKER_03 14:20

I wonder how it is now that Brightline's running by it every day. You know, before it was probably like you maybe get three or four trains go by. Now you're getting you know 50 of them a day, probably. I don't know how many go back and forth, but it seems like a lot now.

SPEAKER_02 14:33

I will tell you the train didn't bother me as bad as the guy with the weed whacker that hit the pipe right behind my desk for whatever reason. So yeah. That's hilarious.

SPEAKER_04 14:43

Were you guys there when the bright line went up?

SPEAKER_02 14:45

No. No. The building's still owned by the company.

SPEAKER_05 14:49

Funny thing is, it actually, full circle moment, turned into Paloma Academy, the school where my son goes. So it's a school for autistic kids. Uh they've since moved into a different space. But yeah, I said, I bet they hate that train going by too. So I wonder if it does bother them.

SPEAKER_03 15:06

So with your guys is like video marketing and the stuff that you're doing uh on like as far as the podcast and everything, like what have you found has worked really well? And what are some of the things we're like, oh that didn't work? Yeah, we're still trying to figure it out every day.

SPEAKER_04 15:19

Always evolving.

SPEAKER_02 15:20

So it is. Video, podcasts, and I remember it was probably 22 or 23. I told our then marketing manager, I go, look, we're gonna do a podcast, we're gonna do it every week, and we're gonna start next Wednesday. So buckle up. And she was like, uh, I was like, we're just gonna do it, don't worry about it. We'll just do that.

SPEAKER_05 15:39

What are we gonna talk about?

SPEAKER_02 15:40

So we yeah, so we just talked about the questions that people we get asked all the time, but but the whole YouTube thing and trying to to place, you know, get videos and this and that, it's a it's it's it's tough and it's a never-ending journey, it's time consuming, it's expensive, it's all these things, but I wouldn't have it in other any other way because our whole goal is to educate people, right? You know, we're not trying to be entertaining because I'm not that entertaining, unfortunately. Lindsay is. Lindsay is, yeah. So I got Lindsay. I'm busy, I'm on the streets. But but we we just try to educate, you know. We figure if if somebody watches it and gets some value out of it, that's the value, one of the values we add back to our partners, our clients, and things like that. But if no one gets value out of it, we're not doing it right. If not, if we're not educating, we're not doing it right. So we always look, we don't look for the tricks to get up, you know, in the rankings and this and that. We just look for better content to educate people.

SPEAKER_05 16:31

I think one thing that that Joe does a very good job on is continually making sure that it is educational. I think people get sucked into doing content and they immediately go for, okay, what's latest and loudest? Oh, well, this is trending, or I'm gonna start focusing on this. And one thing that's remained for gosh, 16, 17 years for him is he's consistently done educational content. And people see these like massive people blow up on social media and they think, oh, that happened overnight. No. No, that's 10 years of a comedian telling jokes on video. Yeah, you just happen to see it overnight.

SPEAKER_02 17:06

Correct.

SPEAKER_05 17:06

So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 17:07

Yeah. I mean, it's it's for those looking to do it, it's it's tough.

SPEAKER_03 17:11

No, so that's what I was gonna say. Like, I I was like the guy watching going, oh, that looks easy. This is not easy. This is not easy. This took a lot of time putting this together, the studio, dialing in the technology, figuring out how we were gonna edit it, you know, doing the reels, having the social media schedule. There's a lot that goes on behind the scenes to get this thing up and running. And I gotta be honest, like, had I known how hard it was, I don't know that I would have done it like it was hard in the beginning to get this thing up and running. Do you remember? I mean, it was like trial and error. Well, and it was so far, like I'm scared to death of social media. Like I always have been. I'm not a big social media person, and I've had to come out of my shell for a lot of this stuff, and I'm getting more comfortable with it, and we're doing a lot of cool things with social media now. But um I just I just never was there for it. Like, I've never really felt very comfortable with it. Uh, my wife always did, and so she kind of helped me with some of that. But like uh this um I think in the beginning for us, it was just like we were so nervous doing it. Yeah, you know what I mean, and then we just got more and more comfortable, and and I think we're putting out better product now and better episodes, and um you know, we're really just trying to bring the real estate community together here and like have like some real conversations that can help other people and and uh you know, and and really just bond with our guests too. Like what it's doing with our relationship with our guests is freaking tremendous.

SPEAKER_02 18:35

Well, I think one big differentiator is that if you're a you know an active salesperson, a loan officer, you see him come in and try the video and it's time consuming, it's expensive, there's not quick hits and you're quick quick ROI on it. So they usually give up because I mean let's face it, that's not the wet best expenditure of their time. But when you have a team and you can work on the business and they're working in the business, it's it works a whole different way. But you know, if you're doing this, you're not doing this, whatever that may be. And this is a perfect example. But I I believe the value add to your your database, your customers, your clients, your partners is is big.

SPEAKER_03 19:12

Absolutely. And so it's definitely helped our business a lot. Like again, like you said, there's no like you almost can't even quantify what it's done for it. But if you look at our sales just over the last year, you know, we've definitely increased sales. You know what I mean? And I can't walk around town without somebody bringing it up in a positive way.

SPEAKER_00 19:31

Oh my gosh. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_03 19:33

And so like I know people are seeing it, it's keeping us top of mind. Right. Um and we just want to be the authority in the space.

SPEAKER_05 19:40

I think people also see it, and if they watch over time, they build trust with you without ever even having to actually be kneecap to kneecap with you. They see it and they go, I remember that, I got value out of that.

SPEAKER_03 19:52

And when I when I think Morgan Financial, like I think a really professional establishment with great values, you know what I mean? And all that is because of what you guys put out. Like I you guys are very strategic in what you put out into the public, and I've noticed that over the years. Like watching from afar, I've always looked up to you guys as a as a company that is very careful with their image, very careful with what they put out and what they do. And I think it creates this everyone else is looking up to you guys as the professionals in the space. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_02 20:25

Like, well, thank you. That's I mean, that's the goal is you don't want to ever put out something that's not with the culture of the company. And that's really important to us. Yeah, because it's a small town.

SPEAKER_05 20:35

You also have a responsibility to to lead if you're doing that. So if the content that you're putting out is misleading or baiting or trying to get other people to follow what you're doing, and it's it's not what they should be doing. I mean, you're in a position of leadership when you when you sit down and you broadcast yourself in your company.

SPEAKER_03 20:54

And as a business owner myself, one of the things I've always thought was cool about you guys, like you guys hire, you just find some really talented people, you know, that have come through your guys' company over the years. And done talented. You know what I mean? Like as a company? Yeah, yeah. No, but I mean like well, you guys have built, you should be really proud of. I mean, it's it's very, it's it's it's pretty awesome to see.

SPEAKER_02 21:16

Well, we we the talent we look for is not necessarily they know how to do loans real well. We just look for someone that fits the culture of the company, yes, that's teachable, that has a thirst for knowledge and is willing to follow an established process and make improvements along the way. Because at the end of the day, you know, Morgan Financial is only as good as our our weakest link. And so you have to bring everybody up, and it has to be a group effort. It can't our our competition is never inside our building, you know. Loan officers, they help each other. I've worked at other companies where that wasn't the case. They would they would cut each other's throats if there's a deal on the line. And I see this still going on today. People in the same office going after the same deals. And that just wouldn't fly with us. You know, we we have an environment where we actually have Sales meeting every morning at 8:30, the whole sales team. And we get together and we we have a you know an agenda, but we we try to help one another out. So the culture is what brings the people up. The process is what allows them to do it consistently, time and time again. So every loan doesn't matter which loan officer does it, they'll put their spin on it, they'll put their personality in it, they'll put their effort into it. But at the end of the day, it's still gonna be done this way because that's that's that consistency. You know, if you think about McDonald's, it's not the best hamburger in town, right? It's not the best hamburger in town. But when you go to McDonald's, you know exactly what you're gonna get, hopefully. I mean, maybe it might be kangaroo, I don't know. But whenever they're but that's the whole thing, is they're consistent. Yeah, they're so consistent.

SPEAKER_03 22:42

And almost doesn't matter what McDonald's you go to, they figured out how to scale that across their company. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 22:46

And the coolest thing that McDonald's figured out, and you can substitute that for Chick-fil-A, you know, Chick-fil-A. Personal preference. Is is there?

SPEAKER_03 22:53

But there's companies in that space that don't do that good job. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_02 22:55

There's companies in that space that don't do that. But you know, the fact that if someone is the chef at McDonald's and they quit or get fired, within five minutes, the next person can make that hamburger to that same consistency. Now we're not quite at five minutes yet, but you know, that's the goal is eight days and seven.

SPEAKER_03 23:13

Yeah, that's phenomenal. I mean, I was in the mortgage business before I was in the insurance business, and I mean eight-day closing. I mean, those are that's phenomenal stuff.

SPEAKER_02 23:19

Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Yeah, well, that's the sign loan app to you know underwriter approved. And that's that's appraisal, title, everything. So we we we lean on our partners to help us out with that. And but most of the time, the 80, 79% of the time, it works every time.

SPEAKER_03 23:32

So one of the questions I like to ask our guests, especially the ones that uh have done some business with us, like what how is it important, like the insurance piece of your guys' puzzle, how important of that is that to your process? And like having a strategic partner like Brightway or you know, another agency, how does that help you guys in that process? And how important is that to you?

SPEAKER_02 23:53

It's more important than people think. You know, that insurance piece, I will tell you, it's insurance. If we go to if they go to the wrong insurance company, I'm not I'm not gonna mention any names. And it's it's an afterthought. You know, the the insurance company lags on getting us paperwork. It it actually affects our approvals. So we like that eight-day approval, right? We want to keep it under 10. But we can't get that without proper insurance. So then up front, I you know, we tell the clients insurance is not an afterthought. This is something you need to look at up front because it could make or break your deal in many situations these days.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

There you go.

SPEAKER_02 24:25

And so, and then what I dislike more is insurance companies that they give the client false hope and give them the lowest possible instead of giving them a realistic look at hey, this is what it, this is what it looks like, you know, this is worst case, best case. Let's get that four point, let's give me you a real number, and then lock them down so then the rates don't raise on them because we've seen that too. So the way it helps is uh well, we love speed, but we like quality. You know, we want it both.

SPEAKER_03 24:51

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:52

Um prices, they're promulgated rates for the most part. But if you find the you know, you can talk way more intelligently on this than I can, but finding the client the right rate, the right coverage that plays into it too. Absolutely. And making sure our customers are taken care of.

SPEAKER_03 25:06

Yeah, and having having an agency that has the product, right? Right. You want an agency that has home insurance product, you know, we're doing business with 40 plus home carriers and we're very versed in all their underwriting guidelines and everything. And so we can quickly look at a deal and assess, okay, this is where it needs to go. And this is gonna, you know, for the zip code or the house or whatever, right? Like there's and um nobody's rate's the same, there's all kinds of variables. And so we've built our entire process here around our referral partners, our mortgage partners, our realtors. Um, the entire process that we've built here is around them and making sure that we're supporting their efforts, right? Because we all work together as a team, you know?

SPEAKER_02 25:45

And and we every once in a while we get an insurance company that doesn't want to play on the team.

SPEAKER_03 25:49

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 25:50

And you're like, this is just hurting the customer experience. Oh, yeah. Because at the end of the day, it's not about any of us, it's about making that customer have the best possible experience.

SPEAKER_03 26:01

The customer experience is really what every business should be thinking about.

SPEAKER_02 26:05

Yeah, and it's you know, some people think their customer is their referral partner. Like, I'm not your customer, right? Yeah, I am a customer, but I'm not the customer. Because if you make the customer happy, I can't be mad at you.

SPEAKER_01 26:18

Right.

SPEAKER_02 26:18

If if you make the customer happy, the realtor can't be mad at you, you know, that they referred you, let's say. Your goal is to make them happy. Yeah, the customer. And then the real everyone else is happy. Yeah. And they refer everyone business. So yeah.

SPEAKER_05 26:31

To Joe's point before when he was talking about internally your team, you're only as good as your weakest link. It it translates into everything else. You're only as good as your business partner. So if you're weak in title or you're weak in insurance, or you know, your weak in appraisals, like you're only as good as the weakest player on your team. So it makes sense to find the best of the best and lock arms because the client experience, like Joe said, at the end of the day, we're all looking for that exponential business that comes with the internet.

SPEAKER_03 26:58

And we all we all want the transactions to go really smooth, right? And be perfect and all that. But we've been in this business long enough to know that that's very rarely the case. And so it takes people around you that are knowledgeable in their space that can pivot and go, okay, this is an issue, but we can solve it. Here's the here's the resolution, you know.

SPEAKER_05 27:14

And how do you act when it goes sideways? Are you gonna throw your teammate under the bus or are you gonna support?

SPEAKER_02 27:18

Yeah. You know, and and even in situations I've seen agents not refer a lender, you know, or an insurance company, and something goes wrong with insurance or lending, and the client still blames the agent for some whatever reason, you know, is that they're the ones that's gonna take the flack. So it's really important that you're working with the right team because you know, on the insurance piece, I mean, that insurance right now in Florida, I mean, I think it's getting a little better. Well, it's made yeah, it's getting a lot better.

SPEAKER_03 27:42

It's a way better market than it was. But I mean, rates are still up, they're not coming down, inflation's really kept rates up. Yep. Um, and the carriers are still licking their wounds, you know, from before. But I will, I, I will say like they're gonna see some rate decrease over the next couple years, uh, a little bit. Um again, inflation's been a big challenge because your average claim is like double what it was three or four years ago. Um and but the market has done a huge correction. You know, the free roof thing is gone. There's just a lot of there was a lot of abuse in our space. Yes.

SPEAKER_04 28:15

And um, we couldn't help out as much as we could.

SPEAKER_03 28:18

Yeah, and so the which which lowered the number of carriers that were really playing in the marketplace, which drove rates up, right? No competition, higher rates. And so now that now that we're seeing a a lot of competition flood the market, um it's only going to drive rates down. And it's great for the consumer, it's great for our referral partners, it's great for everybody because it just more competition means better pricing, better product. You know, there was kind of a a race to the bottom on coverage, um, and now that's kind of stopped, and people are starting to get good coverages back in their policy and um at a good price, you know, you weren't you're not having to jump in the coverage anymore to get a decent price. Um there's just a lot of great product in the market, and we're able to say yes to a lot more customers than we were.

SPEAKER_02 29:00

Do you suggest that people that have an existing policy shop their policy right now if they got in the last couple years?

SPEAKER_03 29:06

Yeah, I mean it's always a good time to take a look at it, right? And it's again like working with an agency that has more product than just a couple carriers, you know. So there's a lot of captives out there that just don't have as much product. And in my opinion, you definitely want to work with an independent agent.

SPEAKER_04 29:21

Aaron Ross Powell And there could have been like even situations to where that's what they had at that moment that that that's what there were that's all they could do, the agent could do for them. And then they did so many, you know, um upgrades or whatnot to the home and you know didn't realize that that can be a huge difference to another carrier. Um but we're getting carriers, you know, um we're getting appointed to carriers and left and right. So I mean these carriers are making allowing us to customize and custom tailored to their preferences. So it's awesome.

SPEAKER_03 29:51

Like say you had a couple claims, you know, a couple years ago or whatever, and you know, you had to take a higher policy because nobody would insure you. Like there's carriers now that are looking at some of that stuff and they're like, hey, we want the business, and you know, the market has kind of changed. We know we're not gonna have those kind of losses again. It's a lot more fun now. The fun came back. It's a lot more fun.

SPEAKER_02 30:10

I think in Florida, one of our biggest challenges is all these the water and the ocean and hurricanes, obviously. But beachside, are you seeing more carriers come back to the beach? Absolutely. Absolutely. Good.

SPEAKER_03 30:21

A lot more.

SPEAKER_04 30:22

They're opening up a lot of their underrating.

SPEAKER_03 30:25

They have to play the game a little bit because they have reinsurance and a lot of their I don't want to get too technical, but they get um, you know, they have to buy reinsurance for their huge catastrophic loss against hurricanes. And so they have to be careful on how much capacity they take on the coast, but they want that premium. You know, they want that higher dollar premium and and uh and we're seeing just really our carriers really start to open up. I mean, they were really getting abused with the roofers and litigation and stuff, and now that that's kind of gone away, they're getting back to very they're getting back to profitability, which eventually is gonna be really good for all of us. You know, I live in a neighborhood where everyone has to have a tile roof.

SPEAKER_02 31:04

And I will tell you there's a period of time. Yeah, oh yeah. There's a period of time where I could barely drive through the neighborhood. There's so many roofing trucks in their replacing roofs. I mean, after the the hail storm in 2000, some of those roofs can be $100,000 roofs on a freaking tile. It's crazy.

SPEAKER_03 31:19

But I mean, that's why it was what it was. You know, it's why companies were going out of business. And we were like we would have a company that had a really good track record with us. We wrote a ton of business with them, and we might have had a thousand policies with them, and in 45 days we had to move all those policies because they were going out of business. I mean, we went through I compare it to like what the mortgage business went through in like 2008, 2009, 2010, you know, when they crashed to what we that was our that was that market for us in the insurance business over the last three or four years, you know? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 31:52

Yeah, I had my first heart attack.

SPEAKER_03 31:54

Just gave me a flashback. I don't know how we survived, but we did. We held on, man. We held on by the skin of our teeth. I mean, it was a tough business to be in. It was really hard.

SPEAKER_02 32:04

I I will tell you though, there's I I moved to Brevard in 2006 and I got into the business. I I felt like I got to the party at like 159, you know, got to the bar at 159 right before closing. I got there, I was all this energy, and everyone else was like, you know, I started a really flounder in 2009. So I I feel like that was the good, a good time to get in the market. I mean, luckily I was young and had the ability to sustain through it. But I look at that in the last couple of years, you know. 2020 was, you know, if if you walk down the street and you were a loan officer, you got hit by like 10 loans in the face. 2023, that went away. And then you had to work for it. You had to, you know, make sure you were contacting your database. Following up, you had to polish up your sales skills. And that's why we I'm bringing back that 8:30 a.m. meeting, that's what that was all about, is bringing back the fundamentals. And so just like in 2008, flushed out a lot of, you know, uh not as as as scrupulous, not as good loan officers. Some of them got some good ones got flushed too. But then in 2022, you know, we we kind of started to purge the system a little bit. And there's there's a lot of good loan officers out there now.

SPEAKER_03 33:09

Yeah. I will say like it made us a better company going through it. It really made us tighten up our processes, it really made us focus on the customer experience and improving that. Like you had to really sharpen your pencil, you had to, you know what I mean? Like it was it was tough. It was a really tough market. But it at the end of the day, I'd never want to go through that again. But it made us a way better company.

SPEAKER_02 33:30

I would I would reiterate that same kind that you know it was it was definitely tough, but going back to the foundations and building back even stronger.

SPEAKER_03 33:37

We probably touched on this a little bit, but what do you think Morgan Financial is best known for in Brevard County?

SPEAKER_05 33:44

I I'll give you the the the my answer, but she'll give you the I'm always I'm always the warm fuzzy piece of it, but accuracy.

SPEAKER_02 33:53

You know, I I look at us as a process and metric-driven company, but that's the COO and me. The reality is that we're a 24-year company, veteran-owned, veteran operated, you know, veteran-focused. So I'd like to think we're best known for VA loans. And that is our specialty. We can do them faster than I shouldn't say anyone. We we can do them faster than just about anybody. You know, we're very consistent with that. We we watch out for the veterans' best interest, even if it's not in our best interest. You know, I I live by the the public's principle. You can call it the long doggers principle, is that I'm if I do a loan for you, Morgan Financial, I represent, I don't want to have to hide from you when I see you at Long Doggers or Publix, because I'm gonna see you.

SPEAKER_01 34:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:34

And I've always lived that way. Not because I'm worried about what you're gonna say, because I we want to do the right thing when no one's looking. So I like to think we're known for our professionalism, our VA loans, and our integrity. And I'll I'll let you answer that.

SPEAKER_05 34:48

Yeah, I I couldn't agree more. I I always go back to our vision statement, which is creating an environment for others to prosper. Because a lot of people out there are doing things in this business to get themselves something for, you know, getting a paycheck or building themselves, which is great. There's nothing wrong with that. But if you want exponential growth, you're gonna take care of the people around you. That's where you get all of that repeat business, and that's how you build a sustainable business. So I think personally that we're known for creating an environment for others to prosper. If we're creating educational content, if we're doing classes, if we're um doing broker agnostic events and bringing the community into our office to learn, to elevate, to grow, ultimately all ships rise with the tide. So I would hope that that's the reputation.

SPEAKER_03 35:36

I get it wrong every time when somebody's you can get a good look at a tubone.

SPEAKER_02 35:42

The way you just said it was perfect. No, she's fantastic. I'll double down on what she's saying, that our vision statement, create an environment for those to prosper. You know, I David Morgan is behind the scenes. You're not gonna see him very often. He's not in the office all the time. Um, but he's a dynamic individual. And he gave me strategic direction. He didn't tell me how to do it. You know, he'll give me, if I ask him, he'll tell me. But he didn't tell me how to do it, but he gave me the strategic directions of number one is don't become blockbuster, right? And and we don't rest on the laurels. And I got too many of them to tell you, but it starts with that vision statement. And when you start to break that down, uh creating an environment for others to prosper. This isn't an owner who who takes wheelbarrows of cash out of the business. This is someone who wants to play the game and win the game, but not at all costs.

SPEAKER_01 36:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:30

And it's most important to me that that I work for a company like that. I sought him out when I was with leaving countrywide. Um, I wouldn't say I was jumping ship, but back in 2008-ish, when there's some writing on the wall, um, I sought him out because of competing against him time and time again. He'll say that he won. I'll tell you that I won somewhere, the truth lies somewhere in the middle, but it was always good competition. Yeah. And going back to that vision statement, I mean, it I I've seen him make decisions time and time again where he could have made it in the favor of himself and he always made it in favor of the person on the other side. Yeah. If it was the fair and right thing to do. Yeah, yeah. Right. So that that vision statement isn't just lip service, it's actually how we operate the company. And so the the client benefits, the client, you know, that's the that's others. You know, the employees are others, our our referral partners. I mean, right down the line, everyone's another. And if you treat others with that kind of respect without ever thought of it coming back, it eventually does happen. Right.

SPEAKER_05 37:28

And it does not be able to do that.

SPEAKER_03 37:28

It's funny what your business will do when you take care of your employees, you take care of your customers, you take care of your partners, right? Like everything else falls into place. Sure. And that's what we try to do here, too.

SPEAKER_02 37:38

You know, it's like we certainly could have made more money along the way, but it wouldn't have been. I like to sleep at night. And I already roll around enough, my wife does not like that. So it's really I can sleep pretty well at night, which is nice.

SPEAKER_05 37:49

Aaron Powell I might say something that might get me in trouble later, but I'm gonna go with it. Yeah, I know. Sorry. Um there was there was a time when you know Joe had mentioned business was rolling in, and I will never forget my boss at the time came in and said, Hey, we have to slow down the marketing efforts. I was like, what are you talking about? This is my only job. What am I supposed to do? Sit here and she says, if it's gonna mess up the customer service and the experience that the clients get, it's not worth it. So don't go out and try and take on more business when we're busy giving good customer experience on the back end. So anybody at that time could have gone out and said, oh, more, more, more. But if it's gonna affect the experience of the client, don't do it. If it's not in their best interest, don't do it.

SPEAKER_02 38:36

You know, you go to a restaurant sometimes and you see these open tables and you're thinking, why don't they just and you're they're telling you there's a weight.

SPEAKER_04 38:42

And you're just like oh God, that's my husband. Why there's open tables there?

SPEAKER_02 38:46

Why don't they just sit us there? Well, they're smart enough to know that if they seat you, you're gonna get bad service and not complain. Exactly. I'd rather not seat the people or turn them away than give them bad service. Correct. Yeah. Great point.

SPEAKER_04 38:57

Yeah. And we strive on that too. I mean, even with the whole marketing and you know, being in here is just I told them like, oh, I can't like I mean I don't mind the commitment. Like, you know, I love doing this and I love like my thing is I love you know connecting with everybody on the outside. The thing is, like, my customers are everything to me. You know what I mean? Like I've been here for almost nine years now, and I've built a you know huge clientele where you know they're referring customers and like, oh, she's great. Now I gotta, I gotta, you know, set the bar even higher. It's your reputation that you want to do. So I'm in here thinking, like, oh my God, I gotta call her back, I gotta do this, I gotta do that, I gotta do it like you know what I mean? Like it's I mean, you always think about those customers. And it, I mean, honestly, some people, I mean, I'll say have no boundaries, but I'm okay with that because I love what I do. And, you know, as long as my customers are happy, like that's all that matters.

SPEAKER_05 39:41

Capacity is a real thing. When you get to a certain capacity where you feel like your cup's overflowing, you'll bring on new people, you'll hire an assistant, you'll bring on someone to help you. But you only have so much capacity.

SPEAKER_04 39:52

And he has been such a great leader and um, you know, someone that is has catered to us in this business and that has made us, you know, every single year I'm growing and growing, and that's just because of him, you know, being able to pour into me. Who you align yourself with matters.

SPEAKER_03 40:07

Well, I just always have looked at the business of it's not about me, it's not about it's if I can build a team and build them up and give them the tools that they need to be successful, the more successful they are, the more successful I'm gonna be. You know, the more successful my agents are, the more successful the business is. And so I've always like put them first in every decision I've made because at the end of the day, like this business is nothing without them. Right. You know, and so we really try to create an environment and a process where people want to be a part of it.

SPEAKER_02 40:40

You know, I I think about what Lindsay said, and the words you said, the that Lindsay, when we when we had to make that decision, hey, slow down business, it's not a decision any any person makes lightly because you know you're affecting paychecks, right? So that's I feel like that was a failure on our part. We could not at that time we couldn't hire good people and train them up fast enough because I'm not gonna accept someone that's not gonna do the job in a certain way. No, and so that goes back to what your comment was earlier about you know maintaining that reputation because we could have been short-sighted and said, let's just take as much as we can, you know, we'll push them off 90 days, we'll tell them to make a closing 45, 50, 60 days. You know, our competition was pushing closings off for 45, 60, telling them up front we'll take it, and then saying, Oh, we can't close, we can't close, we can't. I wouldn't do that. I mean, I said, look, rate the 35-day contract. You know, I was like, 35 sounds reasonable because you don't get it till the 30th day and whatever. But, you know, so those decisions aren't made lightly, but then that's a failure on on me. Everything stops with me, really, and that we weren't able to hire and train. But now, you know, we've been through these gyrations. We have the processes, we have all the metrics that say, I mean, on my on my um management team, we have 187 metrics we look at on a weekly basis. And that's just management. Each each team has their own metrics because they'll tell you exactly how you're doing, whether you want to hear it or not. What you need to do, where you need to focus, and where you need to back off. And so, like now that we have that, we've been through that experience. So next time that happens, I got a game plan for it. We pull out. So that's why I say process and metrics are the backbone of the company. Yes, relationships matter. Yes, you know, the the sales matters, but at the end of the day, if you're not measuring it and you don't have a process in place to deal with it, it it's gonna be a challenge. It's gonna be a challenge to scale.

SPEAKER_04 42:30

I uh I honestly love the whole metrics thing. I'm glad that we like really I'm like a numbers person. So when I see like numbers, I'm so motivated by numbers.

SPEAKER_05 42:38

You strike me as being someone very competitive. I am so Me too. So I think for competitive people, having a scorecard, you need to see what the scorecard says.

SPEAKER_03 42:46

I think it's hard to have success in this business if you're not competitive.

SPEAKER_02 42:49

But you know so many people just want more. Like I just want to do more. Well, that's great, but how do you know if you're getting more or not?

SPEAKER_05 42:54

It drives me crazy. He's always like, what's more? Quantify more. I'm like more.

SPEAKER_02 43:00

I'm like, give me a number. One through ten.

SPEAKER_04 43:04

I just I'm just more so impressed of like even being on the phone. Like now we have a metrics of like who's on the phone, who picks up the phone, and everything like that. So when I see my numbers high on the phone, I'm like, oh nice. I'm talking to a lot of people. It's not just like a transactional thing. I'm getting to know my customers, you know, in type of situation.

SPEAKER_05 43:19

And also marginally dressed stuff. So it's like you may be making a hundred phone calls a day, but what's your closing ratio on that? Okay, if you're not even measuring how many phone calls, how do you how do you scale up from there? So if you're like, okay, I make a hundred phone calls, um 20 of them are yeah, I am brainwashed, but in in the best way possible. But then you're like, okay, only 20 people are picking up. And of those 20 people, am I having productive conversations? Okay, what am I going to tweak today that's gonna make tomorrow better or next week better? Oh, yeah. And then it just becomes routine. It's like muscle memory. And then making a hundred calls or 60 phone calls or whatever you're it's just natural.

SPEAKER_02 43:53

But you know, at the end of the day, some people get it and some people don't. Right. We had this metric back in the day where like, you need to make 35 hours. Outbound, you know, relationship phone calls a day. And we had some people that would call, hang up, call back. I'm like, look, you're a you're a commissioned salesperson.

SPEAKER_05 44:10

It's only hurting you.

SPEAKER_02 44:11

It's only hurting you. This is just to help you get to your goal. Some people get it and some people don't.

SPEAKER_05 44:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 44:16

So, guys, walk us through. So 8.5 days, you know, from application to loan approval. Walk us through that uh for somebody listening. Like what's actually going on behind the scenes in those eight and a half days?

SPEAKER_02 44:30

Well, you know, this is this is the the secret sauce. And I'll give you the recipe. And I've I've said this out loud for years, and lenders just don't do it. So the first thing it starts with a good process at the sales side. Okay. And obviously, if you get someone pre-approved, you're already you're already half the battle. Yeah. But here's where a lot of people make mistakes is that loan officers they do their own pre-approvals for pre-approvals at a lot of companies. And so they want to rush through that and give give you a piece of paper, the realtor, a piece of paper so they can take them shopping. And we say, well, why is the salesperson giving an approval out up front? If you're only as good as your weakest link, why is a salesperson do it? Let's get that to a an underwriter. So underwriters do our pre-approvals up front. And it's the same underwriter, and I I insist on this, it's the same underwriter that's going to make the final decision. So they've already seen the file by the time they get a contract. So we have it underwritten up front by an actual underwriter that's going to make you know the contract. Now, might that take a little bit longer up front? It might, but then you're you're not throwing something at the wall to see if it sticks. It's a solid deal that's been underwritten by the underwriter. And I think we have that reputation in town that if it's a morgan financial, secured approval, we call it, it's going to close unless there's issues with title appraisal or the borrower goes and buys an RV, which we tell them not to do. And then if once it gets so if you're pre-approved the right way, then it gets to contract. Well, we move quickly. So we did a process map of everything back in the day and said, these are all the things that got to be done. And we said, who's going to do them in what order? And if you still have the loan officer involved, you're missing the boat because they're they shouldn't be involved. It should be the operational team that takes that deal, underwrites it quickly, efficiently with quality, but underwrites it up front again. They don't give it to a processor to collect things, only for the underwriter to give them a whole different list of things. So the underwriter looks at it again up front and says, This is what I need, it goes to the processor. The processor collects those things, it goes back to the underwriter. The underwriter says, that's what I asked for. We're good to go. And so the difference is we flipped it. Instead of the underwriter looking at the end, they look at it at the beginning.

SPEAKER_04 46:34

That's good. I love that. I like that too.

SPEAKER_03 46:35

I love that. Because well, you guys are also you guys are underwriting in-house, right? In the office right there in Melbourne. So which is huge. Because everybody else, I mean, I can't say everybody, but most people are outsourcing all that to a centralized location or whatever. And like you said, it's at the end of the process almost where the underwriter finally gets their hands on it. No, I love that. Because it you're flipping it on its head and you're it it makes a lot of sense. And the fact that you guys have the underwriting in-house does help a lot in that process and allows you guys to do things that um, you know, are uh are just different from a process standpoint than most.

SPEAKER_05 47:09

Aaron Powell I think it's the accountability piece of it, too. A lot of times in other situations, people say, oh, we have in-house underrating and it's under the umbrella of that company. That person could still be in Orlando working for home. They could be in California, New York. I've seen some of the Dubai.

SPEAKER_00 47:23

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 47:24

But there's zero accountability. So the loan officer's job is to get the deal done. The underwriter's job is to protect the client and make sure that they can repay that, right? Yeah. So it's a conflict of interest most of the time. This one's just trying to get it done, and this one's trying to protect everybody from it.

SPEAKER_03 47:38

I saw the funny uh, I guess I call them TikTok videos or whatever, that you know, where it's the little clip or whatever, and it's the loan officer going, Yeah, we'll be closed in five days. And then and then the process, it's like, and then it pans to the processor, and she's like, Oh, this will be like three weeks. Yeah. And then it gets to the underwriter and he's like, I don't think it'll ever close.

SPEAKER_00 47:58

It's so true. Yeah, that's funny. That's exactly what it's like.

SPEAKER_02 48:02

But going back to the the, I'll bring the vision statement and creating an environment for others to prosper. We don't just look at you know the our time frames, we look at the contract and say, we got to get this done by this date because they have contractual obligations where a lot of lenders they don't care. You know, they they're like, well, we're gonna get it done at this time. We're not gonna look at the appraisal until five days before closing. And then you're out of contract. You know? So it's really important to watch out for the customer.

SPEAKER_05 48:27

Trevor Burrus, Jr.: I just envision underwriters being like, I wield so much power. I will stop your contract.

SPEAKER_02 48:33

I will end your deal. That's how we feel about our underwriters. Yeah. That's the thing. And they our underwriters are fit our culture. They're trying to figure out ways to make it work, ways to make it work within the guidelines, within the rules and the laws, not ways to kill the deal. Right. They're looking for ways to make it work. Because that's what you have to do.

SPEAKER_05 48:50

And if the underwriter wrote the secured approval and they're sitting kneecap to kneecap with the loan officer on a weekly basis, they're not going to say, oh, sorry, I don't care. I I dropped the ball here. They're going to say, oh my gosh, I promise this, I'm going to deliver this.

SPEAKER_02 49:03

Trevor Burrus, Jr.: Because they'll have me in their office.

SPEAKER_05 49:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 49:06

Well, and I'm sure there is, you know, and they're an underwriter for a reason, right? Like they're supposed to underwrite the risk and make sure that mortgage financial is taking on a risk that's going to pay back, right? And that's and so there are probably, you know, um, there's a good reason for them in the process, apparently. You know? And so you know, I don't know the logistics, I know enough to be dangerous, but I'm sure that underwriter is supposed to make sure this is a sellable loan.

SPEAKER_02 49:31

That's you know that's it. But here's the bigger thing that a lot of people don't understand is that when that when we underrate a loan, we actually underrate it, we close it with our money, and we sell it off in the secondary market. If that loan goes bad, almost for perpetuity, if there's any kind of fraud, if there's it's a buyback to us. So if it's a $400,000 loan, we have to give them $400,000 and they give us back a note, whether that note's performing or not. So the risk we take is astronomically higher than pre-well, you guys take some risk, everyone takes a little risk.

SPEAKER_01 50:02

Right.

SPEAKER_02 50:02

But we take a very high risk on every single loan we wrote. And that's not just us, that's every lender on the planet.

SPEAKER_04 50:08

It's a lot of money you guys work with. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 50:09

We we push a lot of money through our lines, yeah. A lot of money goes through.

SPEAKER_04 50:13

You got a $2,000 policy. I can afford to screw up on that.

SPEAKER_02 50:17

Well, but but there's also, I mean, I'm sure there's lawsuit potential everywhere. But you know, we we avoid we avoid risk as we mitigate risk the best we can.

SPEAKER_04 50:26

Similarity, like too, as um, you know, and a producer too. I mean, when I see somebody and somebody's like, how can I get this to closing? I'm contacting my underwriters. I'm like, listen, this is what I have, this is what they're planning on doing. Um, what can you do for me? You know, and majority of the time you're like, okay, we'll exclude water at this point, and then when they do it, then we'll add it back on. But yeah, we can write it, you know. But it's all about like how you can, you know, talk to your underwriters and have that relationship with them and get it done. Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_05 50:52

I love that. Because it everyone always asks us the rate questions. Oh, I'm getting a lower rate over here, and Joe always says it's a function of math. And why is that person getting a lower rate? That it it's a lot deeper. It's like it's like an iceberg.

SPEAKER_02 51:04

It might not be getting a lower rate.

SPEAKER_05 51:05

It might not be a lower rate, right? It's just that's what they knew that you were interested in. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 51:10

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 51:10

I'm always asking, give me that quote that you got from the other AJ and just want to see. Like, you know, I want to see what I'm doing wrong. Majority of time, they're cutting coverages and all that stuff.

SPEAKER_02 51:19

Yeah. Well, and on your side, that it maybe it's the opposite of cost. There's no cost because it's not covered. I mean, I don't know how that works, but yeah.

SPEAKER_03 51:29

So you guys are really knowledgeable about the market. One of the things we talked about earlier was you know, you guys are always educating and and doing the videos that educate people on the process and and what's going on in the marketplace. So kind of tell us today. Today is what is today? Uh no idea.

SPEAKER_04 51:44

Tuesday the 21st.

SPEAKER_03 51:46

Tuesday the 21st of July. So how's Brebar County's market today? And where do you think we're headed?

SPEAKER_02 51:53

Well, I'll tell you the things that attracted me here 20 years ago. I I I I moved here from Los Angeles. I'm not from out there. I I lived in Winter Park, Florida before that. But the things that attracted me to here then are still attractants. I mean, there's a good job base. And now it's different, it's changed and it's gotten even better. You know, we have what, five different space programs here. You know, we have a great job base. Um, we have beaches, we have rivers. I I think it's the most amazing place to live. Now don't tell everybody that. Because but I like that we're growing. Yeah. You know, and and we've when I moved here, we only had one or two good restaurants. Now we have several. You know, it's there's more choice. Um traffic is still not bad here. So the as far as the market goes, you if you're talking a real estate market, you know, five years ago or three years ago, people said, Oh, market's gonna crash, market's gonna crash. I said, Well, what makes you say that? You know, the demographic suggests differently, especially in our market. And I and I like to think we're separate from the national market. I think we're a pocket that is benefiting from certain growths, especially the space growth. You know, certain pockets in the country are not doing well, they're going down at alarming rates, but I don't feel that here. I haven't seen, you know, we had multiple offers on multiple um contracts over the weekend, and that's pretty persistent. Our loan officers are up 26% year over year on business. You know, when I look at other loan officers' numbers, they're going down, but it depends on the market you're in. You know, nationally, I think the market's stagnant, maybe a little down. I think locally, we're a pretty strong market.

SPEAKER_03 53:26

Yeah, I think our job market here in Brevard is pretty unique to a lot of areas because because of the Space Center and because of our aerospace industry, right? Um, we're bringing in really high value jobs too. Um and as you know, your SpaceX and your Blue Origins and your um what is it, Affinity Space or whatever, you know, all these companies come into play. Like we're there as we grow here, I just think that there's so much more potential for Brevoir.

SPEAKER_02 53:53

Yeah, I remember when the Challenger was a space shuttle program, um the space bus, I called it, when that came to a close, I was pretty worried about the Cape. And I mean there's a lot of good people lost jobs, I get that. But a lot of those jobs have been replaced with higher tech, higher paying, you know, better for lack of a better term, uh jobs, and it's really benefited our market. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_03 54:13

Well, yeah, yeah. So when they lost the job at the um the Space Center, they were picked up by other aerospace companies that were moving to the area to fill those voids. And now we have this awesome aerospace industry, you know. Amazing. It's incredible. On top of the Space Center, you know, and it's um it's just cool, man. We we I I I'd love to see the growth here in Barbara. I always said we were like the best kept secret, and now the secret's out. Barely.

SPEAKER_02 54:37

I mean, it's it's out, but I mean it is it's an incredible place.

SPEAKER_03 54:40

I'm so glad you're and really from an affordability standpoint, we're still more affordable than South Florida. Right. Um, we're not as busy as North Florida. Like we kind of have that sweet spot in the middle. We're surrounded by water. It's a beautiful place to be. Um, it's a lot of why a lot of people grew up here and stay here. Yeah. Or come back. Or come back.

SPEAKER_02 54:59

In the boomerang. Yeah. A lot of my friends from here, they left, went to college, made their way back.

SPEAKER_03 55:05

So what advice would you give someone buying or refinancing in the current environment?

SPEAKER_02 55:10

You know, uh house is always a good investment long term. A lot of people miss that. They try to time markets. That's never proven to go well. Because you if you can pick what the market's going to do, please let me know. Uh that would be very helpful. We've we've every time we think we know we're wrong. And so if you look at time, rarely has the value of a home gone down over a significant amount of time. So if you need to buy a house, it's still better than renting, in my opinion. That's my opinion. Rates are historically not that low. Now it's hard to tell someone that a six six point whatever percent interest rate is better than a three and a half percent interest rate, but I really don't want to experience the things we had to go through to get a three and a half percent interest rate again. I hope we don't ever have to experience that again. So if you need a house, it's always a good time to buy if you're gonna be there long term and it makes sense for you and your family. As far as refinancing goes, refinance is always a function of math. And you know, we had a we had a borrower that had a three point something percent interest rate on their house, yet they had credit card debt at 27.5%. And when you look at the blended rate, it was well over six percent. So a good loan officer that's knowledgeable and understands these things is going to look at the entire picture. And so even a refinance, refinance, if you're if you have a really low rate, can make a lot of sense, you know, better cash flow. Maybe they need cash out for education or a remodel or just to fix to get the insurance back, right? I had a similar issue. But but um these things being said, is it's a function of math and your needs. And so even right now, we're seeing a lot of cash out refinances of cashing out people at 3%, three point whatever, and putting them into six point whatever, whatever, whatever. Putting them in the higher interest rate, but the whole picture made sense because they had a cash crunch. Yeah, you know, they had a need for money out. Um, maybe they won had to make repairs to their house, send their kid to college, like I said. But it made sense. And and so that's what a good loan officer is gonna do. The biggest mistake a customer can make is go in thinking they know everything about what they're doing. Because we've we've seen the people, they come and say, I just want a 30-year fixed rate and I need it at this interest rate. You're like, well, you have all this debt over here. Maybe instead of putting this much down on your purchase, we only put this much down, we pay off this debt, and now your cash flow is greatly improved, and you can you can pay this loan off a faster rate.

SPEAKER_03 57:34

Yeah. And also when the water heater goes or the roof needs to be replaced or the unforeseen happens, yeah, you're ready for it.

SPEAKER_02 57:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 57:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 57:43

Absolutely. So to wrap that up, it's it's never a bad time to buy as long as you're gonna be as long as your horizon is longer. You know, and it and as far as refinancing, make sure it makes financially because a good salesperson, I shouldn't call them good. A salesperson can manipulate the numbers. You need to look at the break-even, like how long is it gonna take to break even on this refinance? What's my cash flow look like, and how long am I gonna be in that house?

SPEAKER_05 58:07

I always love to hear Joe when he's having conversations and people say, Oh, Joe, you know so much about the market. Is now a good time to buy a house? And he always just goes, Do you need a house? If you need a house, then yes, it's a good time to buy a house.

SPEAKER_02 58:19

Well, I'm a strong advocate of buying house to grow wealth, number one question. Yeah. The biggest reason why this country is so wealthy is because of the 30-year fixed rate mortgage. Now, people will argue that with me, but I'll tell you there's that's where majority of people's wealth is and is in their home. And if you don't own a home, how are you growing your wealth?

SPEAKER_00 58:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 58:39

You need a place to live. You might as well pay for a place to live that hopefully puts equity into your house.

SPEAKER_03 58:46

When do you when you uh when you guys are talking to people that are renting, it kind of goes in the hand what you were just saying. Like, what's that conversation like? Because is there a time when you should be renting and not buying? Or is there you know what I mean? Sure. There is. And and uh is it like if it's short term, you don't want to be maybe buying in a market short term?

SPEAKER_02 59:04

Is that kind of what you're doing if it's short term, you know, you and you don't plan on holding the house and renting it out after you leave, you know, two or three years, probably not a good time higher horizon to even recover your closing costs unless the market's just going up so fast. But what goes up fast used to come down fast, but we didn't find that last time around.

SPEAKER_03 59:22

Yeah. No, the market's been really resilient. Right. There's been a lot of downward pressure on the market, whether it's insurance rates being way up, um the uh just interest rates being up. You know, there's just been a lot of things where I've I've been kind of looking going, man, we've been resilient as hell. Like it's a demographical issue.

SPEAKER_02 59:42

We had a lot of people uh that needed homes and there wasn't enough homes. It's a supply and demand. You know, if the if the supply is low, the demand is constant, price is gonna go up or stay stay constant at worst.

SPEAKER_03 59:54

Yeah. Because like you were saying, like there's no crystal ball that's gonna tell you what the future is. And I I my prediction was that we were gonna see a huge slowdown. Like I just thought it was coming. Um it's really been the opposite for us. Our business has been booming over the last couple of years. Um when I thought things were really gonna get tough. I I mean uh don't get me wrong, I think the volume is down year over year. We've been able to figure out how to pick up more market share during that time frame. But um yeah, this this real estate market here in Brevard has been really resilient.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:25

It's it's a definitely a lesson in some kind of economics.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:30

Oh, for sure. All right, so being on Brevard for as long as you guys have maybe we'll have a couple different categories here, but what's your favorite restaurant? Date night starts. We'll start with date night. Where are you guys going on date nights?

SPEAKER_05 1:00:43

Date night. I don't have many date nights. My date nights are in a golf course. Um but restaurants, my favorite go-to is Hole in the Wall, but it's called Peace in the Garden. Oh, yeah, that one are there. I believe it. Where do you live? I live in I live in Rockledge.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:58

Uh okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:59

What? Yeah. Right down the street, girl. Okay. I love Rockledge too.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:04

Now we love peace in the garden.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:05

We get it a lot of people.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:06

Yeah, we do get lunch there. It's just fresh food. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:09

Yeah. That's you know, date night with four kids. I mean, my wife and I didn't really have a lot of date nights until the last couple of years. Yeah. So we call that that. No, that's like we're not drinkers. We don't drink, but we go to Haru Happy Hour a lot. Haru's a little um Japanese sushi bar beachside. I love drifters in Indialantic or Indian Harbor Beach. Drifters is a small, but man, their food is phenomenal. Drifters. Drifters. Yeah, that place is phenomenal. It's family run, it's very small. Um they're they're they lived in Costa Rica on a boat, I think. They have a restaurant there, restaurant here. Very good. One of the best. And then for fine dining, also that Coco in Cocoa Beach.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:49

They come up every podcast.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:51

Yeah. That place is so good.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:53

I haven't been there yet. So good.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:54

I went there for just dessert the other day. Like we just had dessert there after eating somewhere else in Coco Beatrice. Oh, you just had dessert. Oh, that's a good idea.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:04

I have a picky husband, so I can't do date night there.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:08

On the casual side, you know, long doggers is still just stable. Long doggers. When I go out the guys, it's long doggers or Charlie and Jake's beachside. Um obviously O'Galey Yacht Club for me, I spend many meals there with my family, but that that's those are my stables.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:24

So I'm Oregon Financial when it's lunchtime and we're buying lunch for the whole office. Where are you guys going? What are you grabbing?

SPEAKER_05 1:02:29

Well, hopefully Kreiderman's is going to be open next to us. Oh, because it's right there, right? You say you'll travel. Yeah. We used to still travel. It didn't matter if we were in the caboose, if we were in Vieira, if we were up in No Galley, everyone used to drive to Kreiderman's.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:42

Oh, Kreiderman's fantastic. So you know when I travel and stuff, I'm I'm I'm passionate about barbecue. I love barbecue. Me too. Um I won a couple small town contests. You know what I mean? Like I just I like barbecue. I it's just it resets me over the week. We have a lot in common then. Yeah. And so I uh when I travel, I like to find the local barbecue join or try the local barbecue. And I will tell you, I've had some really good barbecue across the country, but I I always kind of come back to Kreiderman's is just as good. Like it's fantastic. Kreiderman's is fantastic barbecue.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:16

And you don't have to wait three hours in line for it, like some places in Austin or Correct.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:20

Yeah, that was we drove three hours from Dallas to go get barbecue and stayed in line for three hours.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:25

So I have a very embarrassing but funny Kreiderman story. Um so doing what I do business development, I'm out meeting real estate agents all the time. Well, I had an appointment with a Sarah, I think her name was, and I was meeting her at River Road Popsicles. So I go in. There's only one person sitting there. I sit down next to her on the couch, I'm like, hey Sarah, so good to see you. Yada yada. We start talking, and I'm like, so how long mind you, I talk a lot. So it's like 10 minutes into the conversation. I'm like, so how did you get into real estate? And she goes, I'm not in real estate. I know Kreiderman's next door.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:57

I'm like, Oh, I know what place you're talking about. Okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:00

Oh, it was mortifying. I was like, it's very nice to meet you. I'm gonna go. She was so sweet. She talked to me for 10 minutes, and I thought we were having an appointment.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:08

No sudden movement.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:12

Where do you guys think the best spot to watch a rocket launch is?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:17

You got it.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:18

Yours trumps all stories.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:20

I had an experience lately, recently, uh towards the beginning of the year. I watched one from a helicopter on NASA property at like a couple hundred feet. And I have a video of this to prove it. And it was my and we had our I don't know if the FCC's or whatever, not the FCC, the uh whatever the airplane is. FAs listen, but we had our we were sitting out the door. We were strapped in, but we were sitting out the door watching this thing go off. Wow. And it was like a mile and a half away.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:50

That's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:50

So that was my absolute best. Other than that, I was people realistically.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:54

Realistically for the rest of us, for the rest of the rest of us.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:57

You know, I remember my first shuttle launch. I still get giddy when I even hear, I'm like, oh my gosh, there's a launch going off. I can feel the rattle. I'll go out and look, I'll see the trail at that point. But you know, I still I think that's one of the coolest things about the Space Ghost. I went to college in in Orlando, and uh, we would see launches back in the 90s. That's how old I am. But the launches of the old shuttle, we could see them from Orlando. And I remember one time I was out surfing at 8th Street in Cocoa Beach. I had no idea launch was going off. I was in college, and the and I everyone was, you know, there's the beach was crowded, and I look up and the the shuttle is going up. That was one of the coolest moments. Next to the the the helicopter being out surfing in hurricane swell in August, that was really cool.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:38

Very nice.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:38

When you see a night launch on the beach, it's pretty incredible. Pretty cool. Yeah, lights up the water. It's it's it's pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:44

Hashtag Space Coast.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:46

There you go. What is your guys' favorite thing about living and working in Brevard County?

SPEAKER_05 1:05:53

Favorite thing about living and working here. Um there's always something to do for the people that. Grew up here, the boomerang effect is real. We used to always call it Melboring. Um, but Joe was right when he said everyone goes off to college and then they kind of boomerang right back because you realize there's so much to do. There's great job opportunity. Um, you it's warm the majority of the year round. You can go to the river, you can go to the beach, you can drive an hour and you're at theme parks, you can go an hour south. I mean, there's five good restaurants, there's pretty much everything that you need here, and it's still a good place to raise young kids. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:32

Yeah, I'll I'll double down on what she said. I agree with all of that. But for me, I my office is 10 10 minutes from my house. I could stop and go surfing in the morning, get to work by the 8 30 meeting, have a full day, go home, you know, go to the beach with the kids, go out on the boat, do whatever. And and it still has that small town feel, even though we've grown up, it's still and you go to like when I go to those places I mentioned, whether it's Charlie and Jakes or Long Doggers, you always see people. You're always seeing people, yeah. And I like that. I like being in a town. And then it does hold people accountable. It's a real community.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:04

It's a community for sure. Like I live in Merritt Island, and there is something special about the island is when you were growing up, you barely went over the bridges. And so, like, there is like a sense of community there that you can't recreate. You know, like kids that graduate high school from there, they just have a different bond, I feel like, than than some other places. Because like I've had friends, you know, where they're they're talking to others, or you know, we all keep in touch and we're still friends and stuff, and we'll have other people kind of come into our friends group and they're like, dude, you guys have like this crazy bond like from high school. Yeah, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_05 1:07:42

And it's like actually kindergarten.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:45

You know, and it is it is special. There's a sp there is a special thing about the island that keeps us there. But I think there's those pockets all over, you know, and the communities here really have each other's back, and everybody looks out for everybody, and um, it's a special place.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:00

Very true. I I I'm always jealous of my kids that they got to grow up here. I grew up in the DC, Maryland, DC area, and it it wasn't the same. I mean, it was a big city. But here, my kids, they're friends with all the kids at the different schools. And I'm like, when you saw a kid at a different school, you was you were worried that there was something was gonna go down where I grew up, but here it's like they know each other. Oh yeah. It's all you know, beachside, you know, they know each other.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:24

There's some competition, but it's friendly.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:25

Yeah, right. But yeah, I just this is such a great place to live.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:29

Yeah, and here on the Space Coast, your your kids can still play outside, right? I feel like a lot of my friends in different parts of the country are like, oh, we don't we don't have our kids just go off by themselves. You still can do that here.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:40

Aaron Powell You just put a little Apple tag on them. Yeah, yeah, for sure. A couple of them on their bikes, their shoes.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:46

I get nervous when Raya goes walking around the neighborhood. I'm still like that. I'm watching her on 360, seeing if she stops.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:52

We have the technology to track them now.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:54

Yeah. Which is a blessing and a curve.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:56

We don't need to get into that one after that. Yeah. All right. Before we wrap up, uh where can the listeners find Morgan Financial? What's the best way for them to reach out if they got a question or need something?

SPEAKER_05 1:09:06

Well, you can call us directly, but if you want to get to know us a little bit beforehand, I would say check out our our podcast, our YouTube, all of our socials.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:13

Website. Definitely check out the website, check the socials out, see what kind of people we are. Awesome.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:20

You can also just walk right in the front door. We're at the Cornovo Galley in US One. So check out the vault. Yeah. Come see the vault.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:27

Well, awesome guys. Hey, I really appreciate you taking the time to come in. I know you're both very busy. Uh it means a lot to us. And uh we appreciate the partnership, we appreciate the friendship, and uh yeah, we appreciate you guys. So thank you very much.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:38

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:38

Thank you.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:41

That's a wrap for this episode of the Studio 321 Podcast, powered by Brightway, the Steve Trout Agency. We can't thank you enough for being part of our journey. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe, leave us a review, and share it with a friend. Until next time, 321, we're out.