Industry Giants Support Affordable Lending Seminar - National Federation of Community Development Credit Unions

Promote Mortgage Initiatives by CUs of All Sizes

(January 1, 2007 – Chicago, IL) The Federation recently held a two-day Affordable Mortgage Lending Seminar at Fannie Mae’s Chicago, Illinois offices on December 11-12, bringing together some of the biggest mortgage industry players to encourage credit unions of all sizes to get into the mortgage business.

The Seminar, which was presented in collaboration by the Federation’s CDCU Institute™ and its CDCU Mortgage Center™, was made possible by the generous support of Fannie Mae, the National Credit Union Foundation, Genworth Financial, ACUMA, Prime Alliance, CU Members Mortgage, CU Partners, and Shore Bank.

The two-day seminar was geared towards experienced credit union mortgage lenders, those new to the field, or those looking to enter into the mortgage lending business for the first time.

Industry experts presented at the seminar on topics such as mortgage lending basics; mortgage fraud prevention; non-traditional mortgage lending and lending to new immigrants; the mortgage secondary market; private mortgage insurance; affordable housing options and programs; and the establishment of mortgage lending partnerships.

Bob Dorsa of ACUMA summed-up the purpose of the Federation’s seminar: “No matter how large or how small a credit union is, there is still opportunity for them to get involved in mortgage lending – whether on their own, or through a mortgage-related partnership or CUSO.”

Patricia Moore, CEO of Prichard FCU in Prichard, Alabama ($800,000 in assets) expressed that “the information provided, the networking, the success stories, and resources available at the seminar have shown me that we are not too small to participate in a mortgage program. Without the resources that were provided, we would have been quite timid in making this a top priority for our credit union.”

Ms. Moore’s sentiments were echoed by other seminar attendees, who left with great motivation and enthusiasm to go forward by either growing their credit union mortgage business or by starting programs to provide mortgage loans to their members.

The Federation plans to have other similar seminars in the future. Interested individuals can contact Ms. Terri J. Fowlkes, Director of the Federation’s CDCU Mortgage Center (tjfowlkes@cdcu.coop) or Pamela Owens, Director of Education and Training (powens@cdcu.coop).