The End and the Beginning

. Uncategorized . ,

A few months ago my ole Bosses went to some fancy conference in which they learned insider secrets on how to be the best mortgage bankers in all the land. It sounded pretty lame to me. But apparently something happened there, and somewhere between Dallas and Houston on the ride back from the conference, one of them had an idea. Within four minutes of arriving home in Houston and kissing their wives and putting their suitcases away, each Boss had called me with the idea.

“Hey! Let’s have a Save the Blog party!”

“Save the blog?” I asked, holding the phone with my shoulder and stroking my fine cat Harold. “Why does my blog need saving? I’ve got like a good ten readers, at least.”

“If you can’t get fifty people to show up at a Save the Blog party, we’re going to take the blog down! It’ll be awesome!”

I stopped petting the cat. “What? Why is this awesome? Y’all want to take me down?”

“It’ll be great!” they chimed.

So the good news is, dear readers, they are throwing me a party. The bad news is they don’t think y’all will come, and the worst news is they think it will be such a hoot to shut me down if y’all don’t show up.

Readers of America, help me out! Come to the Save the Blog party the evening of June 13th! Save Just the Assistant!

More details to come…

In the meantime, please read my interview with the founder of Envoy Mortgage, David Zugheri. I know, you’re thinking it will be lame. It’s not though. David is a funny guy and even hugged me after the interview (probably so I wouldn’t write awful things about him). Read on!

Why Aren’t You the CEO?

An interview with Envoy Mortgage founder, David Zugheri

Just the Assistant: First things first, David. If you were going to hire someone to go on Envoy Mortgage’s Circle of Excellence trips as the official blogger, who do you think would be the best person for that job?

And if you need help, here are some good articles that a lot of people in the industry are reading that discuss this very topic:

Purdy Please

The String Puller

Water Cooler Moments

David Zugheri: Probably James Beaver. James knows his stuff.

[JTA note: James Beaver is my boss. James Beaver will NOT be the blogger.]

JTA (glaring): James isn’t available. Let’s move on because you clearly aren’t cooperating here. What made you decide to start a mortgage bank?

DZ: I was passed over for a position in my former company in 1997 and I felt stuck. And the only way to unstuck yourself is to go out and grab life by the horns. At the same time, Dana was getting shot down by another mortgage company.

[Just the Assistant Note: Dana Gompers is the other founder. I have not interviewed him but once I saw him at Memorial Park and introduced myself. My husband was with me and wearing short shorts, so it was a little awkward.]

There were a lot of people we looked up to in the industry, and we thought, they don’t know much more than what we know. But we had more desire than they did. Both of our former companies told us, “If things don’t work out you can come back,” and that motivated us. We also wanted more control over the process.

JTA: Okay, so I don’t understand, if you started this company, why aren’t you the CEO? If I started a company I would totally be the CEO.

DZ: Our company had reached 350 employees in 13 states. It was the responsible thing to do to bring Rick [Thompson] in to add structure. It’s like this: you can be a great hair dresser, but that doesn’t mean you’d be great at running a salon. You could be a great mortgage banker, the best mortgage banker there is, but that doesn’t mean you’d be a good branch manager or regional manager.

JTA: So your company was growing like crazy?

DZ: Yes. When the financial meltdown happened in 2008, we saw that as opportunity. We started growing so fast that we needed help.

JTA: What do you do when people don’t do what you say? Do you fire them?

DZ: I just talk to people. I say, “Hey, I would do that, so why shouldn’t you?” I always lead by example.

JTA: If I had your power I would just fire them.

DZ: You wouldn’t talk to them? I think you’d talk to them first.

JTA: No, I’d totally just fire them. So listen, why do you have that big glass wall in the foyer of the corporate office? That’s so weird. Why did you do that?

DZ: We thought it conveyed transparency.

JTA: But it’s so awkward because this one time I came to corporate and all these world leaders were sitting in there in a meeting and I felt so self conscious in the foyer, like I should be sitting up straight, but not too strait.

DZ: Well it’s also fun when we have parties. Some people can hang out in the foyer and some people can be in the conference room but you still feel like you’re all together.

JTA: Hey, that sounds fun! When’s the next party, hmm?

DZ: Uh, ah…in four and a half years when we celebrate our 20th anniversary.

JTA: You’re a really powerful man, so I’m wondering, what does your house look like? I imagine your house all white. Is it all sleek and minimalist with big black gates at the front and guards? Are the guards armed?

DZ (rubbing his face in agony): First of all, I don’t even have a house. My kids have a house. It’s their house.

JTA: Ha! Do you make them pay your mortgage?

DZ: No, but I should. My house is not white. It’s, it’s, there are so many toys. So many toys… They stick their drawings on the walls, and the toys…

[JTA Note: He then showed me a picture of his son in a playroom. Did you ever see that movie Escape to Witch Mountain? Remember all the toys? It was like that. Or like on Big when he buys all those toys. I didn’t post the picture here because I figured somehow I could get sued, but you get the idea.]

JTA: Do you dream about mortgages?

DZ: Absolutely. Well, mortgage stuff, business dreams.

JTA: I’m really sorry about that. You should try it out here at the bottom because I just get to dream about flying and my pets talking and stuff. Okay, finally, is there anything you want my readers know?

DZ: Yes. They are in on something that is going to be big. Just the Assistant is going to be huge. Rush Limbaugh started somewhere. You’re going to be big like him. You’ll have your own radio show.

JTA:  Actually, I won’t. The ole Bosses are threatening to take me down. Well, thanks for your time, David! It’s been a hoot. Now go answer all those phone calls!

David Zugheri

I Said a Sentence on the Radio

. Career Aspirations . ,

Street Talk Live Funny

I talked on the radio. I talked on AM radio on a finance show called Street Talk Live. (Read here to find out how this came about.)

I got there fifty-five minutes early because I was so panicked about being late. I do that a lot if I’m nervous about an event. Once, in college, I showed up so early for an exam that the building wasn’t even open and there were still homeless people asleep in the parking garage stairwells.

I passed the time by practicing what I’d say if they let me talk on the radio. I called my husband and was like, “Okay, how’s this? ‘I’m Christina Ledbetter and I write a blog called Just the Assistant dot com.’” That’s really all I had. My husband said it was great. For the rest of the time I tuned in to 700 AM to prepare for my big break. It was a different show than the one I’d be sitting in on. Mostly, I heard people call in and complain about the government, and then the host would make a joke and the caller would laugh and say he hates liberals.

Finally, it was time to go in. David Zugheri (the founder of Envoy Mortgage), sat waiting in the lobby. Dude was so intimidating. I’m kidding. I seriously thought he was going to hug me when we met. He kind of did a start toward one but I stuck out my hand to show that I’m super professional (and I didn’t want to mistakenly start to hug him back and realize he wasn’t going to hug me after all). Then we sat down and I grilled him with my Just the Assistant interview tactics. More on that later this week (I know, you’re dying; just hold your horses).

Ten minutes later one of the radio guys came out. His name is Lance and I think he does important stuff with other people’s money. He was really friendly. I thought it would be a huge deal that I was showing up for this radio show but David was all, “This is Christina and she’s going to sit in on the show today,” and everybody else was all, “Cool!” I thought they’d have to background check me or something.

The next thing I knew, they’re all, “Okay, we’ve got about four minutes until we’re on,” and we all rush into this fancy radio room with microphones and buttons and gadgets and screens and the radio producer has me sit down at a mic and asks, “So are you going to be talking? What are we doing here?”

I literally go, “I was invited to just sit in a chair.” Then I started to sweat. After that, this other man comes in and hands me a set of earphones and they’re all like, “We’re live!” and telling callers the number to call.

This is the hosts telling the callers that they have to pay taxes.

These are the hosts telling the callers that they have to pay taxes.

Oh my gosh, they’re live. I’m breathing on the radio. Can they hear me breathing? IPO price – something per share. Gold prices down. Tesla a good car? What the heck are we talking about? Oh no – my stomach just made a noise. Do I have to toot? Please say I don’t have to toot.

And then they introduced me. And I said a sentence! I said, “That’s right.” I was so excited I texted my husband.

Radio

This is it. This is when I go viral. While the host and David tried to calm a caller who wanted to know if he could stop paying taxes, I wondered about my blog stats. The host had said the name of my blog like three times. I’m telling you, this is how people go viral. I decided to do a quick check. It looked something like this:

Viral

The single hit was from the radio host clicking on my blog so he could read from it. I guess I’ll go viral later this week.

Alright folk(s), stay tuned Thursday to read my interview with the founder of Envoy Mortgage. I promise it won’t be lame (my first question was whether he’s going to let me go on our company’s Circle of Excellence trip next year).

Also, my ole Boss Chad Helmcamp is trying to hijack my blog again. You know what I need to do? I need to give him his own blog so he’ll leave mine alone. Until then, keep reading here (and subscribe on the right if you so fancy). Off to see if NPR needs any help.

Street Talk Live Guest

Things Fall Apart (Seriously)

. Office Happenings . , , , , , ,

I came in the office today and walked directly over to Online Dater Jason to inquire about his love life. Instead of finding a smiling, noisy Jason like usual, I found a gloomy Jason all hunched over his desk wearing a visor and glasses (he doesn’t wear glasses). Here’s the thing. Jason woke up in the middle of the night with his allergies going haywire and eyes itching galore. Two hours later he woke again, scratching at his eyes like a wildcat. And this morning when he finally got up, the guy was nearly blind. “Jason,” I said, “I think our readers need to know what you’re going through.”

“I don’t think so,” he said.

“You above sympathy loans?” I offered.

Not above sympathy loans, after all.

Not above sympathy loans, after all.

That got me thinking, maybe I could play up everybody’s ailments here. I passed Hottest Mortgage Banker in Texas Hayley’s cube. “Got any ailments?”

She thought for a while, and then lit up. “I bumped my hand on the door!”

“Perfect!”

Please send us loans.

Please send us loans.

After seeing the attention everyone else was getting, V-Shaped Mortgage Banker Will offered to drum up a flesh wound by smashing his head into his desk.

Ailing Will

Okay, y’all, I’m not even kidding about this next part. As I was prancing around the office asking people for their ailments – “Anybody got any bursitis?” – the ole Boss James walked in. He’d been at the doctor. An orthopedic surgeon. And he was wearing this giant leg cast! I may have physically pushed Jason to the side when I saw James’ ailment. “Sorry Jason. You just got upstaged, buddy.”

Thankfully, James isn’t above trying to score a few sympathy mortgages either.

Help this man. Send mortgages.

Help this man. Send mortgages.

Turns out, James has been experiencing mystery foot pain that resembles, as he says, “someone shoving a knitting needle into my ankle.” (I’ve not had that experience so I’m not sure what’s going on with the ole feet.) He’ll be in the boot for three weeks, and after that, well, we really don’t know. I’ll keep you posted.

UPDATE

What the heck is going on? Y’all, I know I stretch stuff here, but I am not making this up. Just So John just showed up. Half his face is swollen – he just had a tooth pulled! He said the dentist offered him laughing gas for $130 but he said he’d rather buy a new mermaid shirt with that money because it’d make him happier in the long run.

Here’s John demonstrating how he can slap his face and not even feel it.

Help a guy out, y'all.

Vicodin rocks

UPDATE # 2

Jason is back from the optometrist. Poor guy has an ulcer. On his eyeball. Caused from contacts or something.

It’s official. Jason wins. Jason has the worst ailments. Send him the loans.

Okay readers,  please remember to tune in to 700AM in Houston tomorrow evening at 6:00 and listen for my breathing in the background of the finance show (because that’s cool, right? Listening to AM radio on Friday nights?).

Now, I’m out of here before one of my co-workers drops dead. Have a great weekend!

Why this Office is About to Brawl

. Career Aspirations, Office Happenings .

‘Tis a double feature, dear readers…

Radio Star

Okay y’all, big news. While the rest of you will be spending your Friday evening sipping martinis at cool bars or watching movies on the sofa with popcorn in your laps or wandering around Ikea, you know where I’ll be? I’ll be on the radio.

Sort of.

Here’s the thing. One of the founders of our company, David Zugheri, apparently does this radio show on Friday evenings where he talks about money. I think people call in. I really don’t know because I haven’t gotten to a point in my life where I listen to AM radio on Friday nights. Well, guess who he invited to sit in on the radio show this Friday? Guess! Come on!

Me. ME!

Now, he hasn’t told me that I’ll get to say anything. I think he literally invited me to sit in a chair and listen to him give money advice on a Friday night on AM radio (which is kind of weird), but I’m just thinking maybe, maybe he’ll mention to the listeners that I’m there. And I’ll be like, “Hey listener(s)!” I’m not sure that there is over one listener. I’ll ask beforehand to ensure my greeting is accurate.

I’m fairly certain this means that after Friday, everything changes. Paparazzi knocking on my door, galas to attend, the whole deal.

Or it may just mean that I’ll be sitting in on an AM radio show on a Friday night. Either way, y’all should listen to see if I get/give a shout out! I mean, unless you’ve got other plans, which I hope you do because if I find out one of you sits around listening to this show Friday evening, I’m going to get totally depressed.

The scoop: This Friday, 6pm-8pm, radio station 700AM

Kitchen Slop

There is a stink going on in our office now about keeping the kitchen clean. About a month ago, the Bosses started keeping the fridge stocked with lunch foods so that we could all make turkey sandwiches throughout the day and laugh and have a grand old time. Since then, I’ve received roughly forty-two emails from various team members telling all the other team members that if they don’t start keeping the kitchen clean, there’s going to be a fight.

Here’s the first email. So it’s like this person is going ahead and saying upfront, “Hey – it ain’t me slopping up the kitchen.”

“Also, moving forward…any glass, mug, utensil, etc. that you personally use, please make sure to rinse off & put in the dish washer immediately after use.  No items should be left in the sink or utensils left in any jars in water in the sink.  They tend to sit in the sink & then have a very non pleasant smell the next day or over the weekend.  It is not fun for anyone to clean up…YUCK!”

Then came this email a week later. This dude’s like, “I’m not the slob either and I’m about to lose it!”

“The kitchen is becoming a source of real irritation for ME.  On a daily basis I hear from someone in the office about how gross it is because no one seems to know how to pick up after themselves.

I am counting on everyone in this office to do their part and pick up after themselves.  When someone recognizes the dishwasher is full of clean dishes then please empty it so we can then fill it with dirty dishes.”

Then I did some sleuthing. I asked everyone, “Who makes the messes?” In hushed tones they told me; it’s the ole Boss James. I confronted him via email. Here is his response:

“I am definitely not the mess maker.  First, I recycle my coffee cup and use the same one for most of the week [Just the Assistant note: Gross].  Second, I had lunch outside the office yesterday [Just the Assistant note: I didn’t say that all the messes happened yesterday, now did I?].  Third, do you have any idea how many dishes I clean outside of this place???!!!!  I could do the tiny quantity of dishes this place generates while I’m in my sleep [Just the Assistant note: Seems like a good reason not to want to do them at work.].”

Then I wrote back and was all, “They all say it’s you.”

And he got all crazy defensive and was like,

“LIES!  The most I do is dirty a knife and occasionally put a glass in the sink.”

Hmm. Did y’all know I read sociology-type books all the time? And did you know I recently read one about criminals and they said criminals will eventually admit to “some” guilt but not the whole “I’m the murderer” guilt? But if they admit to some guilt, they’re probably the murderer. Bam. James is the mess maker.

Alright folks, you go ahead and set your radios (do people have radios anymore?) to 700AM in preparation for Friday night, and I’m off to make a sandwich and blame the mess on James.

Lies Banks Tell (And a Bird Update)

. The Scoop on Home Loans . ,

The Health Department called. The birds outside our office died from ant poison that had been sprinkled on the grass. Funeral service details will be announced later this week.

Now then, listen up…

It’s not uncommon for folks to call our office and ask us to look over a quote they’ve received from a Poopy Big Box Bank or a Janky Pinstriped Suit Lender (well, they don’t ask me, but you know what I mean). Basically, the borrower wants to know if we can beat the other guys’ prices. But here’s an interesting twist. Guess how many times those other quotes have bold face lies splashed across them? Boo coos of times, I tell you, boo coos.

Last week one of Hottest Mortgage Banker in Texas Hayley’s borrowers called her because she’d gotten a quote from a Poopy Big Box Bank. This other quote was in the form of an Excel spreadsheet (fancy, huh?), and contained a fabulously low interest rate, some blatant miscalculations, and a few bold faced lies.

Here’s how that bank lied through their crooked teeth. The borrower, a nice lady looking to buy her first home, planned to put less than 20% down on her house (totally a normal thing to do). Now in this borrower’s case, she absolutely had to obtain mortgage insurance (MI). Anytime any of us gets a loan and we put down less than 20% (unless we’re doing a 2nd loan, which this lady was not), MI is mandatory. But you know what that janky lender left off the quote? The monthly mortgage insurance fee, which amounts to probably over a hundred dollars a month for this lady. It’s not that she wasn’t going to have to pay it, rather the lender didn’t include it on the quote in efforts to make it look like the borrower’s total monthly payment would be way low.

Then the lender included lots of pretty blank spots for title fees and the escrow account, making that monthly payment look lower by the minute.

I asked Hayley about it. She said,

“Their quote looked great since they didn’t list title fees, an escrow account or mortgage insurance. But when I quote someone I am going to list every single fee the borrower is going to have to pay, and I’m going to overestimate some of the ones that we haven’t nailed down yet, because I’d rather have the conversation of ‘Looks like you don’t have to bring as much money to closing as we thought’ than telling someone they actually need twenty thousand dollars more to buy this house.”

[Note: when I say “fees” I’m talking about third-party fees that you’ll have to pay on any loan – fees that the title company or mortgage insurance company are charging, not Envoy.]

I’d planned on pasting the quote here on the blog so you could all see the atrocities, but honestly, I didn’t understand the thing. And that leads me to my lesson. Y’all, I’ve worked in this industry a total of six years now (if I include the mortgage banker I worked for in college who had me pick up her vicious poodle from the groomers once a month), and I honestly still don’t know how to intelligently read quotes. I will openly admit that most of my readers are way smarter than me, but it’s still possible that the average person cannot fully dissect some of these wack lenders’ quotes. And that’s why you need to either a) just get a quote from someone reputable in the first place (like these people) or b) take the janky quote to someone reputable (same people as above), and ask them to go over it with you.

Okay, sorry for the rant today. I just care about y’all (really, I do) and I hate to see folks getting tricked.

Now, off to collect shoe boxes to bury all those dead birds.

Birds, Dog, a Horse, and My Co-workers

. Office Happenings, The Scoop on Home Loans . , , ,

I may have caused a bit of a mini-panic to settle itself on my Houston readers concerning the dead birds falling from the trees outside our office. Y’all are so touchy, I swear. Listen, at this point, nobody in the office is running a fever, and our front desk receptionist, Christi, even exercised for the first time in her life yesterday (I made her go on a walk with me and you would have thought it was the SEALs training),  thus proving that all our lung capacities are still optimally running.

Here’s what’s happened since Thursday. The Humane Society finally showed up and took “samples” (dead birds) with them to run some tests. After they left, birds kept on dropping, and Juan, our awesome building maintenance man, had to run out and scoop them up as they fell. But then Juan had to go run an errand, and for two hours the birds piled up. Otis watched nervously from his post inside the building and directed visitors around the “samples.”

Meanwhile, until Otis hears back from the Humane Society, he’s busy trying to find out what’s up by frantically searching the Internet, which worries me because I don’t want Homeland Security tracking his searches and thinking he’s a lunatic. Hey Homeland – Otis is a really great guy! I swear!

Enough of the bird debacle. This week I’m working on writing bios for the team for some website we’re going to have (why this website isn’t enough for us, I do not know). I’ve been pulling the mortgage bankers into a conference room and asking them all their hopes and dreams. Here are the highlights:

  • When I asked Richard about his dog, he abruptly got up to go fetch his phone to show me pictures. On his way back to the conference room from his desk (like, four feet away) he was so engrossed in the dog pictures that he passed the conference room and walked into some random office. I was like, “Richard! Hey Richard I’m in here!” Dude loves his dog. He also loves everything else about life and I’m having a hard time coming up with a snarky nickname for him. More on that later.
  • When I sent Straight Shooter Shane the rough draft of his bio, which included the phrase “frat house” because he used to be in a creepy fraternity, he actually wrote back: It’s never a “frat house” always a fraternity lodge or house…. Otherwise, I love it! That’s so weird. It’s just so weird. What is a “lodge” anyway? Lodge. It sounds like throat lozenge. I asked him if he still wears his letterman’s jacket, and he frowned and gave me some lip about not having a class ring. And he still won’t show me the secret frat house (d’ya hear that!?) handshake. Also, I have changed his name to Straight Shooter Shane because the guy totally tells clients what’s up. Not a coddler, that Shane.
  • V-Shaped Mortgage Banker Will, forgetting it was an interview for a professional bio, ended up telling me some horrible story about a horse getting killed (he didn’t kill it). Y’all, come on. I’m trying to bring you business here. Don’t go telling me about the night an axe murderer broke into your house.
  • In Just So John‘s interview, he told me about a loan he did for a transgendered person, and Just So John had to file all this paperwork to prove that his client was one person and not two people since the guy/girl’s W-2s from one year said Bill and the next year said Veronica. And you thought you had a tricky loan?

Oh, and by the way, apparently nobody listened to me last week when I said to get a loan somewhere else, because our business is exploding this week. Two borrowers in the past hour have called Online Dater Mortgage Banker Jason asking for loans, and I know this because he’s all, “BOOM!” and singing and giving people high fives. (Dude loves mortgages.) Then he made a big sandwich to celebrate.

That must've been one big loan...

That must’ve been one big loan…

Alright folks, I promise I’ll let you know as soon as we hear from the Humane Society. While you all be on the lookout for falling parakeets, I’m off to edit these bios and try to make this group of people with whom I work appear fairly normal. Wish me luck.

The Office Stink(s)

. Office Happenings . , ,

I’m kind of wishing I’d gotten my flu shot now. I walk in our building today and Otis, our beloved front door man, stops me. “I think I’ve got something for your blog. The birds.” Then he points outside and I’m thinking, Sorry Otis. You’ve got to give me something better than bird watching, pal. I smiled politely and nodded, about to walk away, and then Otis tells me more. “They’re falling from the trees and dying.”

“What!?” I asked, shifting my laptop bag from one shoulder to the other.

“You want to see them?” Otis offered.

“No! What are you talking about, Otis? Are the birds flying into the building? Because you know I’ve seen stuff like that happen.”

Thankfully, Otis is a patient man. “They’re just dropping from the trees. I called the Humane Society, but they just said to leave a message. Health Department’s here now though,” he said, pointing out the back door of the building toward a truck.

Then he pointed out front, indicating a woman in a business skirt and heels. “See those wings at that lady’s shoes?”

Oh my gosh. I might throw up.

Y’all, there are dead birds falling from the tree outside our building. I thanked Otis for the scoop and told him we’d check back in with him later to find out if we’re all about to catch bird flu or whatnot. (If this picture shows up small and crooked, refresh your page, because I worked for like an hour on this. My janky blog site has been making my pictures small for some reason, but it’s important you fully understand the bird situation.)

Dead Birds

Then I come in to find out one of our processors (Colorado-Bound Nikki (she’s constantly threatening to move back to her home state of Colorado)) has been pilfering through the mortgage bankers’ trash cans to retrieve any recyclables. I’m not making this up. She got so tired of asking everyone to place empty cans in her cube (she takes them home to recycle) that she gave up and began garbage diving. Next thing you know she’s going to tie herself to the dead bird tree outside in some sort of green protest.

Y’all, I know the grand purpose of this blog is to make you all fall in love with us and eventually get mortgages, but today is just not a good day. Don’t call. Don’t fill out a loan app. Don’t email. I don’t care how low interest rates are. Just don’t do it. Stay home. Enjoy your apartment. Lay out by the pool. Call the crappy Big Box Bank if you want a loan. Things are too bananas here for guests.

Alright readers, you all go get a shoddy loan from somewhere else, and I’m off to rent a Hazmat suit (and then give it to Nikki to recycle when I’m done).