The diaper aisles are full of people who were only going to have two children. The universities are full of 24-year-olds who were only going to take 4 years to get a degree.
Tanta, I resemble that (it, them?) very much. What's worse, if I hadn't founds something even more ridiculous to do with my time, I would probably be out trying to sell '10 years too late' mortgage software to brokers...
MLM, don't feel bad. I once took a job at a savings and loan that was in some trouble with the RTC. It was only going to be a temporary job because they needed someone who could write some policy and procedure manuals really really fast. I had no intention of staying in the mortgage business. I had no intention of getting into the mortgage business. I had been an English major. I thought "LTV" was some new educational cable channel.
So I got pretty thoroughly suckered. I can only guess that all the grizzled veterans at Countrywide have cashed out and retired, and they've suckered in a new class of innocents. As far as I can tell they were not English majors.
Hey. I was just getting teased by certain persons yesterday for having written some great long post that only scratched the surface of the issue.
You want to know what happens to your average consumer when the loan officer gets to "now, here we have scenario 17, where we waived your esrows, added .25 to your discount, kept the 5/1 ARM and had you paying monthly MI instead of the financed single-premium . . ."?
barely, people "know" there are costs to the no-cost loans just like they "know" there is no free lunch. In other words, this is just a basic commonsense belief about the world.
What they do not know is whether $600 is a reasonable charge for an appraisal, whether seller-paid points are sneaking into the contract sales price, or how their estimated tax and insurance payments are being calculated on last year's assessed value of a vacant lot.
If CFC wanted to stun and surprise the mortgage industry, they'd start publishing actual cost to originate loans and markup on things like settlement services. I can assure you that that would get everybody's attention.
What kind of people respond to national surveys with anything other than a click and dialtone?
I'm just guessing, but they may be the same ones that cause my inbox to be clogged with ads for masculine equipment enhancement products (I believe that statement meets the blog "G" guideline).
Some day this war's gonna end, but not before I get out of the diaper aisle...
"If CFC wanted to stun and surprise the mortgage industry, they'd start publishing actual cost to originate loans and markup on things like settlement services. I can assure you that that would get everybody's attention."
barely, people "know" there are costs to the no-cost loans just like they "know" there is no free lunch. In other words, this is just a basic commonsense belief about the world.
Commonsense? From the same crew of people who are saying that "real estate always goes up"? Did someone slip you decaf this morning?
Most people know that there's no free lunch for other people but the hope springing eternal in their little puppy hearts will convince many of them that there's a free lunch for them.
During commercial breaks in yesterday's Science Channel special on dinosaurs (did you know that baby t-rexs had feathers?), I would flip to C-Span's "Road to the White House" featuring John Edwards. Senator Edwards was visiting a neighborhood in Cleveland suffering from a lot of foreclosures. He's a pretty smooth politician, so the transition from "debtor" to "victim" was seamless. His climactic stump speech consisted of the following items- 1. A national predatory lending law, 2. A national bailout fund for victims, and 3. A cap of 37% on all "payday" loans.
I guess the first idea would have been good six years ago, the second idea could get out of hand pretty quickly, and the third idea outlawing "usury" is gonna make a lot of wiseguys happy again.
At least Countrywide decided to dress up their "doing what they did yesterday," routine with some worthless "study."
In my neck of the woods the bright boys at Di-Tech just run commercials telling people they can borrow a skajillion dollars while paying 37 cents a month w/ the tag line "people are smart," i.e., "you know what you're doing, don't let us get in the way..."
Both sadly and fortunately, I think the reality is such loans don't get anywhere near the bulk of people who were taking loans from Di-Tech a year ago. I would imagine the people who are currently getting these loans, if anyone is at all, have an awful lot of equity to lose, and they are very likely to lose it.
The Quicken Loan people also seem to continue to push loans with an advertised payment of $500 or $600 on $150K or so in debt. Just sick.
Most people know that there's no free lunch for other people but the hope springing eternal in their little puppy hearts will convince many of them that there's a free lunch for them.
Oh no, does this mean I'm not going to get the money back from Nigeria?
Tanta, as an English major who spent a considerable amount of his career in meeting rooms with Captain Obvious and his older brother Major Oxymoron, I always tried to remind myself that it could have been worse. I could have spent more time writing HR policy manuals, for instance.
Oh no. No no no. I can see you've never been to a "live" "vaporware" presentation.
What they do is, they bring in a laptop and projector so they can show you exactly how the software really really works, by using a remote connection to their test database.
Four hours later, after six attempts to login and seven crashes and 150 versions of "oh, I guess they've made some code changes since yesterday" the lights come up and you get to look at bad xerox copies of screen prints and Visio flow charts.
Then some cynical bitch in the corner asks how soon they'll have something closer to "beta" to show us, and they explain that it's going to be in beta by tomorrow at 2:15 or so. Then somebody asks who the beta client is and after some hemming and hawing you find out it's you. The person who already promised this nitwit that we'd sign on as a beta client over six drinks at the last convention is never actually in the room at this point, so all hostility is directed at the poor techie doing the presentation, who didn't have anything to do with this.
They're still here. I get about one of those a month. Except nearly all the time the demo is web-based and the sales droid is calling in. And it still goes to hell about half the time. And webinars... don't get me started on webinars.
Tanta - STOP! You are bringing back too many memories of wasted hours looking at vaporware. For those who haven't had the opportunity to sit through one of those, Tanta's description above is right on. Frankly, it was all I could do to keep from strangling someone - and the vendor and my boss who made me sit through it were tied for first.
As to Countrywide's brilliant idea, c'mon....would we have really expected anything different??
Just remember a lurker here, who was on the other side of those presentations; who had a letter of reprimand sent to his manager, complaining that he told his opposite over at the customer is was not prime time/ The letter sent by the marketing type buying those drinks.
I would like to meet the 24% who were against choice. Maybe they misunderstood what the survey was about, or maybe they learned economics from this guy:
My friend used to only give the presentations on a laptop, no projectors. The software was sold to small businesses, so it was OK not to use projectors. When the program crashed, she'd quickly point at her eye and say "Now, another way to get to this screen is this...". Then she'd log back in and find her way back to where she was.
Nice trick.
Tanta, you left out the part of the story where the techie calls 3 months later to say his company is being acquired by HP for $1.5 billion, and that he's retiring to Hawaii. And the end of the story where a VP from HP calls 6 months after that to say they're cancelling the product and that they hope you'll look at their other product (which is the one you were using before being 'invited' into the beta program).
Of course I recently saw the alternative briefing. We got two hours of training and were then told "of course this will all change in two months with the new release."
"...let's keep encouraging people to think that "I'm only going to be in the house for two years" is something other than the wallpaper on the corridor to Hell. The diaper aisles are full of people who were only going to have two children..."
Perfect, Tanta.
This era's new paradigm has been "Home Borrowship".
Another i liked was, "ya know, in Japan they have 100 year mortgages..."
MLM: And the end of the story where a VP from HP calls 6 months after that to say they're cancelling the product ...
Once upon a time (before my career really started to collapse) I depended on Ignite. Right now ... I can lift up my mouse and read this very text the pad: Build Your Universe With HP & Softbench. All through The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe... "Carly should have been the Witch, Carly should have been the Witch ..." Believe me when I say, I feel your pain.
Just remember a lurker here, who was on the other side of those presentations; who had a letter of reprimand sent to his manager, complaining that he told his opposite over at the customer is was not prime time/ The letter sent by the marketing type buying those drinks.
There's a 'joke' among marketing folk that companies should always give lie detector tests to new sales hires... then hire & promote those you catch lying. The bigger the whopper the higher the job position.
If they will lie to get a job, they will lie to keep the job.
Similar joke among lawyers... you want a job at a prestigious law firm then make sure to pass 'legal ethics'... Want to be a partner then be the type to pass ethics on the second try.
Tanta: barely, people "know" there are costs to the no-cost loans just like they "know" there is no free lunch.
Haha. People know there is no free lunch. Haha. Funny.
He's a pretty smooth politician, so the transition from "debtor" to "victim" was seamless. His climactic stump speech consisted of the following items- 1. ... 2. A national bailout fund for victims...
What they do is, they bring in a laptop and projector so they can show you exactly how the software really really works, by using a remote connection to their test database.
Four hours later, after six attempts to login and seven crashes and 150 versions of "oh, I guess they've made some code changes since yesterday" the lights come up and you get to look at bad xerox copies of screen prints and Visio flow charts.
Then some cynical bitch in the corner asks how soon they'll have something closer to "beta" to show us...
Since I have to do a thesis defense "live" to two locations in two states, this information is not very comforting. But at the very least, I know to bring bad copies of the powerpoint as backup.
The diaper aisles are full of people who were only going to have two children. The universities are full of 24-year-olds who were only going to take 4 years to get a degree.
Tanta, I resemble that (it, them?) very much. What's worse, if I hadn't founds something even more ridiculous to do with my time, I would probably be out trying to sell '10 years too late' mortgage software to brokers...
Children start out as an inexpensive pastime that gets out of hand.
MLM, don't feel bad. I once took a job at a savings and loan that was in some trouble with the RTC. It was only going to be a temporary job because they needed someone who could write some policy and procedure manuals really really fast. I had no intention of staying in the mortgage business. I had no intention of getting into the mortgage business. I had been an English major. I thought "LTV" was some new educational cable channel.
So I got pretty thoroughly suckered. I can only guess that all the grizzled veterans at Countrywide have cashed out and retired, and they've suckered in a new class of innocents. As far as I can tell they were not English majors.
yeah but on the other hand would you prefer a lender who over the lifetime of the loan provided you with the best service and lowest costs?
Do you really want to fill in loads of options?
Could it be possible you could find a lender you trusted??
"The results show that the majority of respondents (76%) strongly agreed..."
What kind of people respond to national surveys with anything other than a click and dialtone?
Hey. I was just getting teased by certain persons yesterday for having written some great long post that only scratched the surface of the issue.
You want to know what happens to your average consumer when the loan officer gets to "now, here we have scenario 17, where we waived your esrows, added .25 to your discount, kept the 5/1 ARM and had you paying monthly MI instead of the financed single-premium . . ."?
What really got me was,
["People clearly understand that there will be costs when they finance a home," said Dan Hanson, managing director of Countrywide]
Of course all those customers knew. They obviously knew those "Zero Cost Loan" programs actually cost a lot of money in fees galore.
barely, people "know" there are costs to the no-cost loans just like they "know" there is no free lunch. In other words, this is just a basic commonsense belief about the world.
What they do not know is whether $600 is a reasonable charge for an appraisal, whether seller-paid points are sneaking into the contract sales price, or how their estimated tax and insurance payments are being calculated on last year's assessed value of a vacant lot.
If CFC wanted to stun and surprise the mortgage industry, they'd start publishing actual cost to originate loans and markup on things like settlement services. I can assure you that that would get everybody's attention.
What kind of people respond to national surveys with anything other than a click and dialtone?
I'm just guessing, but they may be the same ones that cause my inbox to be clogged with ads for masculine equipment enhancement products (I believe that statement meets the blog "G" guideline).
Some day this war's gonna end, but not before I get out of the diaper aisle...
Tanta, that was a fine and soulful rant for a Monday morning. Thank you!
"If CFC wanted to stun and surprise the mortgage industry, they'd start publishing actual cost to originate loans and markup on things like settlement services. I can assure you that that would get everybody's attention."
You got mine. Something like...?
barely, people "know" there are costs to the no-cost loans just like they "know" there is no free lunch. In other words, this is just a basic commonsense belief about the world.
Commonsense? From the same crew of people who are saying that "real estate always goes up"? Did someone slip you decaf this morning?
Most people know that there's no free lunch for other people but the hope springing eternal in their little puppy hearts will convince many of them that there's a free lunch for them.
During commercial breaks in yesterday's Science Channel special on dinosaurs (did you know that baby t-rexs had feathers?), I would flip to C-Span's "Road to the White House" featuring John Edwards. Senator Edwards was visiting a neighborhood in Cleveland suffering from a lot of foreclosures. He's a pretty smooth politician, so the transition from "debtor" to "victim" was seamless. His climactic stump speech consisted of the following items- 1. A national predatory lending law, 2. A national bailout fund for victims, and 3. A cap of 37% on all "payday" loans.
I guess the first idea would have been good six years ago, the second idea could get out of hand pretty quickly, and the third idea outlawing "usury" is gonna make a lot of wiseguys happy again.
At least Countrywide decided to dress up their "doing what they did yesterday," routine with some worthless "study."
In my neck of the woods the bright boys at Di-Tech just run commercials telling people they can borrow a skajillion dollars while paying 37 cents a month w/ the tag line "people are smart," i.e., "you know what you're doing, don't let us get in the way..."
Both sadly and fortunately, I think the reality is such loans don't get anywhere near the bulk of people who were taking loans from Di-Tech a year ago. I would imagine the people who are currently getting these loans, if anyone is at all, have an awful lot of equity to lose, and they are very likely to lose it.
The Quicken Loan people also seem to continue to push loans with an advertised payment of $500 or $600 on $150K or so in debt. Just sick.
Most people know that there's no free lunch for other people but the hope springing eternal in their little puppy hearts will convince many of them that there's a free lunch for them.
Oh no, does this mean I'm not going to get the money back from Nigeria?
Sure you will, all you have to do is send me a money order for $500USD to cover my costs and I'll get your money inside of a week.
The Quicken Loan people also seem to continue to push loans with an advertised payment of $500 or $600 on $150K or so in debt. Just sick.
That Quicken loan program, btw, is called "Smart Choice."
Tanta, you're beautiful...keep up the great work
Tanta, as an English major who spent a considerable amount of his career in meeting rooms with Captain Obvious and his older brother Major Oxymoron, I always tried to remind myself that it could have been worse. I could have spent more time writing HR policy manuals, for instance.
Lemme guess. That conference roon was atuffy, windowless, and of course, fluorescent-lit with flicker and hum. And PowerPoint was involved, wasn't it?
David, do I know you????
And PowerPoint was involved, wasn't it?
Oh no. No no no. I can see you've never been to a "live" "vaporware" presentation.
What they do is, they bring in a laptop and projector so they can show you exactly how the software really really works, by using a remote connection to their test database.
Four hours later, after six attempts to login and seven crashes and 150 versions of "oh, I guess they've made some code changes since yesterday" the lights come up and you get to look at bad xerox copies of screen prints and Visio flow charts.
Then some cynical bitch in the corner asks how soon they'll have something closer to "beta" to show us, and they explain that it's going to be in beta by tomorrow at 2:15 or so. Then somebody asks who the beta client is and after some hemming and hawing you find out it's you. The person who already promised this nitwit that we'd sign on as a beta client over six drinks at the last convention is never actually in the room at this point, so all hostility is directed at the poor techie doing the presentation, who didn't have anything to do with this.
Man, those were the good old days.
"Man, those were the good old days."
They're still here. I get about one of those a month. Except nearly all the time the demo is web-based and the sales droid is calling in. And it still goes to hell about half the time. And webinars... don't get me started on webinars.
Tanta - STOP! You are bringing back too many memories of wasted hours looking at vaporware. For those who haven't had the opportunity to sit through one of those, Tanta's description above is right on. Frankly, it was all I could do to keep from strangling someone - and the vendor and my boss who made me sit through it were tied for first.
As to Countrywide's brilliant idea, c'mon....would we have really expected anything different??
Now where's my valium...........
"Then some cynical bitch"
You? A cynic? I would have never guessed. It's good. Someone needs to sound the alarm that remembers how things are supposed to work.
Just remember a lurker here, who was on the other side of those presentations; who had a letter of reprimand sent to his manager, complaining that he told his opposite over at the customer is was not prime time/ The letter sent by the marketing type buying those drinks.
Here's their slogan
"Countrywide IT. We create. Others imitate".
Yeah right.... so perhaps that's why Countrywide is looking for a VP, User Acceptance to directing and manage product sign-off for production release
Someone explain to me, why in a rational world, you would sell something to someone as 'free'.
Does not the whole concept resemble the shell game on NY city streets?
I would like to meet the 24% who were against choice. Maybe they misunderstood what the survey was about, or maybe they learned economics from this guy:
YouTube - Principles of economics, translated
Position: VP, Bankruptcy \t
Employer: Countrywide Financial
Location: Tempe, AZ United States
Last Updated: 7/20/2007
Job Code: 10014085
I bet whoever takes this job should request a bed in his/her office for some all nighters...
Any takers ?
My friend used to only give the presentations on a laptop, no projectors. The software was sold to small businesses, so it was OK not to use projectors. When the program crashed, she'd quickly point at her eye and say "Now, another way to get to this screen is this...". Then she'd log back in and find her way back to where she was.
Nice trick.
Did I mention that CFC's web portal for loan originators is called CLOUT? Their automated underwriting engine is called CLUES.
I look forward to Countrywide Loan Options And Costs Analyzer.
Tanta, you left out the part of the story where the techie calls 3 months later to say his company is being acquired by HP for $1.5 billion, and that he's retiring to Hawaii. And the end of the story where a VP from HP calls 6 months after that to say they're cancelling the product and that they hope you'll look at their other product (which is the one you were using before being 'invited' into the beta program).
Of course I recently saw the alternative briefing. We got two hours of training and were then told "of course this will all change in two months with the new release."
"...let's keep encouraging people to think that "I'm only going to be in the house for two years" is something other than the wallpaper on the corridor to Hell. The diaper aisles are full of people who were only going to have two children..."
Perfect, Tanta.
This era's new paradigm has been "Home Borrowship".
Another i liked was, "ya know, in Japan they have 100 year mortgages..."
"I look forward to [C]ountrywide [L]oan [O]ptions [A]nd [C]osts [A]nalyzer."
Tanta
Tanta, did your elders not warn you that what spewed from your mouth (and not from your cloaca) would cause it to be washed out with soap
FooMeOnce, you're dealing with someone who once wrote the "Mortgage Asset Due Diligence Operations Guide."
I am one of the elders doing the warning.
MLM: And the end of the story where a VP from HP calls 6 months after that to say they're cancelling the product ...
Once upon a time (before my career really started to collapse) I depended on Ignite. Right now ... I can lift up my mouse and read this very text the pad: Build Your Universe With HP & Softbench. All through The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe... "Carly should have been the Witch, Carly should have been the Witch ..." Believe me when I say, I feel your pain.
Television and internet are the best birth control devices yet invented.
Well if you're in one of those long stuffy meetings and are asked 'does anyone care to vent?'... you now know what to do:
From Wiki...
In birds the cloaca is also referred to as the vent, and among falconers the word vent is also a verb meaning "to defecate."
The things you learn here at CR.
Just remember a lurker here, who was on the other side of those presentations; who had a letter of reprimand sent to his manager, complaining that he told his opposite over at the customer is was not prime time/ The letter sent by the marketing type buying those drinks.
There's a 'joke' among marketing folk that companies should always give lie detector tests to new sales hires... then hire & promote those you catch lying. The bigger the whopper the higher the job position.
If they will lie to get a job, they will lie to keep the job.
Similar joke among lawyers... you want a job at a prestigious law firm then make sure to pass 'legal ethics'... Want to be a partner then be the type to pass ethics on the second try.
Its like the old Accounting joke "How much is 2 + 2?", correct answer: Whatever you want it to be.
I suggest considering a change in site name to "Mortgage Bankers Anonymous".
Tanta: barely, people "know" there are costs to the no-cost loans just like they "know" there is no free lunch.
Haha. People know there is no free lunch. Haha. Funny.
He's a pretty smooth politician, so the transition from "debtor" to "victim" was seamless. His climactic stump speech consisted of the following items- 1. ... 2. A national bailout fund for victims...
Vote Free Lunch Party 2008!
Reagan Jr. in 2012!
I suggest considering a change in site name to "Mortgage Bankers Anonymous".
IF trend continues, soon the only mortgage bankers to be found will be anonymous.
What they do is, they bring in a laptop and projector so they can show you exactly how the software really really works, by using a remote connection to their test database.
Four hours later, after six attempts to login and seven crashes and 150 versions of "oh, I guess they've made some code changes since yesterday" the lights come up and you get to look at bad xerox copies of screen prints and Visio flow charts.
Then some cynical bitch in the corner asks how soon they'll have something closer to "beta" to show us...
Since I have to do a thesis defense "live" to two locations in two states, this information is not very comforting. But at the very least, I know to bring bad copies of the powerpoint as backup.