Embrace Home Loans, a top-ranked national mortgage lender, is actively recruiting loan officers, underwriters and loan processors to meet the growing demand for its mortgage products.
Embrace has originated $5 billion in mortgages in the past 12 months and has seen its production increase 100 percent so far this year.
Embrace is one of the nation’s leading mortgage lenders, with more than 650 team members across the country. The company has hired 45 new employees over the past three months alone and will be significantly adding to that number. It is licensed in 48 states and the District of Columbia.
Embrace’s recruiting efforts are being driven by loan volume growth in all three of its major channels of business: Direct-to-Consumer, the Financial Institutions Group (FIG) and Retail.
Embrace Home Loans responded early and quickly to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to CEO Dennis Hardiman. Even before social distancing guidelines were implemented throughout the country, the company transitioned many of its employees to work from home and has supported them with online communities that focus on employee well-being, virtual team-building and support. The company also provides relief days for employees who needed to care for someone with the coronavirus.
“We have been well-positioned to capitalize on the current origination market and have been able to expand our production volume considerably, even given some of the economic challenges that COVID-19 has brought on,” Hardiman said. “We have been measured in our growth and are well-diversified with three production channels to ensure that our growth is sustainable in changing markets. That is something we have done very well for over 37 years. As a result, we are proactively adding teammates to meet the business demand.”
Embrace is hiring in three origination channels:
- Direct-to-consumer. In the next 60 days, Embrace has plans to hire about 20 mortgage loan associates and 10 loan officers to add to the current team of loan officers in its direct-to-consumer channel, all based in Middletown, R.I., the company’s headquarters location. The company plans to add additional teammates before the end of 2020. The company recently launched a six-month “Mortgage Loan Associate” program to educate new hires with no mortgage experience about the mortgage industry, as well as about Embrace’s systems, compliance requirements and sales process.
- Financial Institutions Group. Embrace is looking to add more loan officers to its Financial Institutions Group, the company’s partnership program for banks and financial institutions, in large part due to its new partnership with Ameriprise Financial announced earlier this year. Through the partnership, Embrace provides mortgage financing and services to the clients of Ameriprise’s wealth management advisors. Ameriprise Financial has nearly 10,000 financial advisors with 2 million clients nationwide.
- For its retail channel, Embrace is aggressively hiring retail loan officers in its current branch footprint along the East Coast. The company is also considering strategic growth by opening branches in new markets within its East Coast footprint.
In addition to expanding its sales teams, Embrace is adding operations staff to meet the continued growth in production. It is seeking branch-based processors, remote underwriters, and closers, who would be located in the company's Middletown headquarters.
“We nurture and develop talent by working with our employees to carve out a clear career path at Embrace,” said Patrick Mullen, director of recruiting. “That is one of the reasons our employees stay with us for so long. The average tenure of our loan officers is just over seven years across all channels, compared to the industry average of approximately two years. At Embrace, we’re firmly committed to our employees and provide them with the support and tools they need to succeed.”
With most loan officers working remotely, Embrace has invested in additional technology to support its sales team and ensure they are able to grow their business. The company created an online learning environment to produce top-performing loan officers through an intensive focus on talent development and side-by-side learning.
Last year, Embrace Home Loans was named one of the Best Mortgage Companies to Work For by National Mortgage News and Best Companies Group. Embrace offers competitive compensation and benefits, a balanced work-life focus and a culture that fosters job satisfaction and success. Embrace also received the first-place award for the Top Mortgage Companies in Customer Satisfaction in the Large Division from SocialSurvey, which released data on customer satisfaction among nearly 200 mortgage companies nationwide.