Our Massive Jumbo Niche & How It Benefits You!

By Jay Voorhees

October 22, 2021 4 min read

Our Massive Jumbo Niche & How It Benefits You!

The median home value in many of our core markets is well in excess of $1 million!

As a result – we were FORCED to become “Jumbo Financing Experts” because conforming (Fannie/Freddie) loans in coastal California are about as rare as California Condors.

And – IT WAS PAINFUL!

It was painful because every jumbo investor that buys our loans has a completely different set of guidelines (that can go on for pages and pages).

It can easily take us up to five hours to pre-approve a single jumbo borrower, and the underwriting process can easily take 5 times longer than it takes us to get a conforming loan underwritten.

In other words, we can sometimes close five to ten conforming loans in the same time it takes us to close ONE jumbo loan!

Am I complaining? Heck no, because this has turned out to be an enormous blessing in disguise.

This is because we have now carved out a jumbo niche and built a super-efficient “jumbo machine” that not a single mortgage bank can match.

WHY IT BENEFITS OUR CLIENTS:

1. FAR LOWER JUMBO RATES!

“Who is this Andrei guy at JVM, and how in the hell can he quote such low jumbo rates?”

That was a comment we heard a competing loan officer make recently, and we hear similar comments all the time.

Our rates are so much lower for two reasons: (1) we have very strong relationships with every major jumbo investor in the U.S.; and (2) we don’t have any “middlemen” to pay – no loan officers, no branch margins, no managers, no nothing. We quote our rates straight from raw pricing, offered by the investors that buy our loans, with no margins or commissions built in.

This benefits borrowers because low rates save them money (duh). It benefits agents because rates matter more than ever, and if agents refer their clients to a lender with high rates, it reflects very poorly on them.

I am confident that my “jumbo rate quote” at the bottom of this blog is one of the lowest in the industry (as per usual), particularly with respect to mortgage banks.

2. EXPERTISE – BEST INVESTOR/NO 11th HOUR BLOW UPS

This factor cannot be overstated, as jumbo underwriting guidelines are enormously complex and confusing.

We sell loans to over 15 jumbo investors and we have to know ALL of their guidelines inside and out.

As a result, we have cultivated an entire team of “jumbo geniuses” (at both the pre-approval and processing/closing stages) with extraordinary academic records and the ability to navigate jumbo guidelines in ways that no loan officer ever could.

They also have more jumbo experience than any loan officer out there because they see dozens of complex jumbo files every month (more than most loan officers can see in a full year).

(I know several loan officers in conforming markets who simply lack the resources and knowhow to pre-approve complex jumbo borrowers, so the files just sit untouched … until the borrowers leave).

In case anyone is not impressed enough, I encourage readers to visit our website (Meet Our Team) to skim the bios of our Mortgage Analysts and Closing Specialists. 😊

Our expertise benefits borrowers and agents alike for two reasons:

We can readily pair every borrower with the best investor for her needs relative to the lowest rate and applicable guidelines.
Our expertise ensures that deals don’t blow up in escrow because of missed guidelines. We know this happens all too often because we constantly get jumbo deals that blow up at other lenders – that both missed guidelines AND offered HIGHER rates.

A Few More Points:

INCREASING HOME VALUES: With home values increasing so quickly in many of our markets (hello Austin, Southlake, North Dallas, Scottsdale and CA’s Central Valley), jumbo will become more and more important.
LOWER THAN CONFORMING: This is another reminder that our best jumbo investors have 1/2% lower rates than anything available on the conforming front. Hence, strong borrowers should pursue jumbo financing whenever they can.