The Myth of Reverse Mortgage Foreclosures?

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Guttentag Questions the Definition of a HECM ‘Foreclosure’

“Whoever controls the language controls the debate”. The purported ‘epidemic’ of reverse mortgage foreclosures has long been a staple for major media outlets to attack the reverse mortgage as a risky and dangerous loan. Closer to home, the incidence of HECM foreclosures has been often cited as one justification for increased restrictions, product reengineering, and the financial assessment underwriting guidelines.

Jack Guttentag -"The Mortgage Professor"
Jack Guttentag -“The Mortgage Professor”

The media loves a good drama. Find a villain and add some emotional tension and you have a headline that is click-worthy. Such a scenario played out in a recent article on Bloomberg.com entitled “Mnuchin’s Reverse Mortgage Woes Blemish Record of Treasury Pick.” Jack Guttentag, aka the Mortgage Professor, was intrigued. The headline is timely since Steven Mnuchin was recently announced as president-elect Trump’s pick for Treasury Secretary. Mnuchin’s blemish in the article centers on his acquiring of IndyMac Bank in 2009 and with it Financial Freedom. Now we can see the ‘reverse mortgage’ connection that Bloomberg hints may point to alleged unethical business practices. Financial Freedom “has carried out 16,220 foreclosures since 2009, or about 39 percent of the country’s reverse mortgage foreclosures, according to HUD data obtained by the California Reinvestment Coalition…” Guttentag was skeptical that one lender could account for such a large percentage of HECM foreclosures.

What ‘foreclosure’ really means

Skeptical, Guttentag researched for the total number of HECM foreclosures since 2009. He uncovered a report provided by the agency to a consumer group in response to a freedom of information request. Since April 2009, there have been 41,237 reverse mortgage foreclosures accounting for roughly 4% of all…

Download the video transcript here.

The New Year Resolution Trap & How to Avoid It


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5 Tips to Avoid Common Pitfalls



reverse mortgage newsI am bracing myself. For what? The fact that my once quiet gym will be crowded with those starting their New Year’s resolutions. The good news is that by February there should be plenty of room and machines to choose from during my early morning workout. All kidding aside, resolutions do hold some value but many fail.

The value of interruption

Sometimes it’s best to avoid January 1st as the start date of our resolution. Why? Once we have made the internal commitment to improve postponing taking action sends the unconscious message that ‘this too can wait.’ Those who have successfully quit smoking have shared that they made a point to throw away half of their last pack. Friends who have committed to losing weight often begin in the middle of the week or the middle of the month. The importance of pairing our decisions with immediate action is key to keeping our internal promises to ourselves.

Looking ahead to 2017 perhaps we should reconsider our approach to New Year resolutions.

Download this week’s transcript here.

Take this Chair & Rock It!



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“Will you still need me? / Will you still feed me? / When I’m 64? The Beatles’ popular tune hit the charts half a century ago (amazing, isn’t it?) during a youth-focused era when the advanced age of 64 seemed ancient to those whose mantra was, “Don’t trust anyone over 30.”

Now Beatle Paul McCartney is a decade older than the song lyric, and just performed as part of an all-star line-up at Oldchella, a septuagenarian songfest that proved aging is a state of mind — especially if you’re among the Boomer generation, now 53-70 years old and 78 million strong.

Teachable Moments from Ageist Behavior

reverse mortgage newsBut ageism persists like shower mold, no matter how much effort we put into cleansing mass perception. And one 64-year-old is not going to take it anymore. Ashton Applewhite just published This Chair Rocks: A Manifesto Against Ageism, and says someone telling her she “looks good for her age,” is a teachable moment in which to evolve ageist stereotypes and language.

In this time of massive social upheaval, Applewhite’s book is a breath of “fresh old air” for seniors, who, says the author, might better be called “olders” — because that’s what they are, and there is no shame in naming the life stage accurately. While seniors themselves have come up with numerous creative reframes for positive aging, it’s heartening to watch an author and activist use deep research to debunk myth after myth about later life, explaining the roots of ageism and how it divides and debases. She’s calling for “age pride” in the same way the women’s movement once called for consciousness-raising.

But she doesn’t expect everyone to jump onboard and agitate for social justice, which is good news for your reverse mortgage clients and prospects who are more introspective. The important point is to consider the information, and enter the conversation. “Everyone is aging, so the number of people who are open to thinking about this is enormous, and that’s the base of a movement. They could be butchers, they could be astronauts, they could be young and they could be old. Ageism cuts both ways and affects everyone, which is fundamental.”

Regardless of our current age, we can each become an old person in training, says Applewhite. “It’s just a mental trick, a way of connecting empathetically and imaginatively to your future self.

“The earlier we make that leap, the sooner our lives are stripped of the reflexive dread that makes aging in America so much harder than it has to be. You glimpse the territory ahead with an open mind, and you’re off and running. I think that’s powerful.”

A Tasteful Way to Tackle Ageism

There are myriad creative ways to implement Applewhite’s advice, such as what this New York City restaurant is doing: hiring grandmas in lieu of chefs! The “bevy of babushkas” is the brainchild of restaurateur Jody Scaravella, whose grandmother cooks hail from thirty cultures around the world, including Argentina, Algeria, Syria, the Dominican Republic, Poland, Liberia, Nigeria — and, of course, Italy. A pair of seasoned grandmas prepares each night’s fare.

Does hiring these mature women — “olders”, per Applewhite — work? “Each time these ladies are in the kitchen cooking, you have hundreds of years of culture coming out of their fingertips,” Scaravella says. “‘I regularly get phone calls from Australia, from England, and from Italy to book reservations. I’m always flattered by that’. And at the end of the night, there are often standing ovations for the nonnas – and the token grandpa, Giuseppe Freya, who hails from Calabria and makes all the pasta.”

The real question is: are the grandmothers wearing jeans while they cook?

2016: The Year in Review

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Looking back at the stories that shaped our industry

2016 brought several changes to the reverse mortgage industry. Before launching head-first into the new year we should look back at the stories that shaped the Home Equity Conversion Mortgage to prepare for 2017.

February brought us…

Download a transcript of this episode here.
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Why You Should Leave


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When You Should Leave the Office and Why

reverse mortgage newsIf you find yourself constantly distracted at the office unable to work on a task, it’s time to leave. Too often the tyranny of the urgent robs our time and prevents us from dedicating our attention and time to projects.

Master Mind



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How to Build Muscle & Look Younger Without a Workout

Everybody knows exercise is good for you. But how many seniors realize they can also improve their health and fitness by exercising their mental muscles as well as their physical ones? Your senior clients can imagine themselves exercising, and build physical muscle!

reverse mortgage newsWe can also laugh our way to health, as journalist Norman Cousins, author of Anatomy of An Illness, described in his breakthrough memoir of recovery from a life-threatening condition. Research shows laughter decreases stress hormones, builds “good” cholesterol, and lowers a senior’s risk of heart disease by reducing arterial inflammation. So perhaps both LOs and reverse mortgage clients and prospects ought to peruse those humorous email forwards that land in your Inbox before deleting them. New research on depression also demonstrates that social isolation leads to inflammation, so laughing with others (or imagining exercising with friends) is even better for your immune system than performing a solo mental workout.

One fantastic bonus: all this imagery boosts mental muscles as well as physical ones. A new study focused on preventing cognitive decline in older adults followed one hundred people aged 55 to 86 as they pursued a specific fitness regime, measuring the effects on their brains through tests and MRI scans. Six months in, the seniors showed not only improved cognitive function but growth in key brain centers as well.

Gym and Jeans

Of course, this study assumes actual rather than virtual exercise. But mental weight training, supplemented by visits to the local fitness club, is going to pay big dividends — a nice supplement to the opportunities a HECM can open up for healthy elders to enjoy their Third Age.

Flexing their mental and physical muscles will also enable seniors to look as good in their jeans as svelte 62-year-old Christie Brinkley. An amusing survey suggests we should ditch our denim by age 53. Fortunately for the apparel industry, 78 million Boomers — the youngest of whom is now at that threshold — seem unlikely to be “retiring” their jeans any time soon. This was a British study, however. England may hold its seniors to a more exacting fashion standard.

Mental Fitness Looks Fabulous

Regardless of how seniors are attired once retired, staying inspired will keep them refired. Yes, the rhyme is intentional: longevity is often the soul of wit. Brain workouts will keep seniors’ physical, mental, and emotional selves humming, and they’re surprisingly easy to do, as this list of ten simple brain exercises illustrates.

My dad, whom I’ve referenced often as an example of unwitting positive aging techniques, learned to use a computer at 89 after my Mom’s passing, and later taught himself to cook eggs for breakfast (he’s of the generation of men who couldn’t even boil water). Number four on the list of brain exercises is, “Take a cooking class.” He simply “enrolled” in the kitchen. When I asked how he learned to make an omelet, he responded, “Trial and error.”

So whether your senior clients are more comfortable in suits and dresses or jeans and flannel shirts, encourage them to build their mental muscles. A happy hippocampus is the way to stay healthy, sharp, and in good humor — as long as those cartoon forwards aren’t in questionable taste.

Results vs. Intentions


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Why Our Results & Intentions Always Match

reverse mortgage news“The road to hell is paved with good intentions”. This popular aphorism underscores the importance of putting action behind our plans and internal promises. During a professional coaching class I attended several months ago one instructor took it a step further stating, “results and intentions always match”.

In Brian Klemmer’s book, “When Good Intentions Run Smack into Reality” he outlines several steps to the path to better results. Here are just a few that we should consider.

1. Identify the result. It’s the familiar ‘work backward’ from the goal approach. Envision exactly what you want, desire and dream of. Is it more loans? A better marriage? Improved health and energy? Be specific.

2. Set the context. The context or environment in which you work toward your result influences everything. Identify the ideal context in which your goals would be achieved. Don’t stop at declaring your context but create it. This could be changing your…

Download the episode transcript here.

Generating Senior Holiday Spirit



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6 Tips to spread holiday cheer

reverse mortgage newsEggnog and mulled wine, a groaning table of goodies, family and friends visiting from afar, heartfelt gifts to share along with the love. That’s the Hollywood version of the holidays (perhaps because both words begin with “hol-“). But it’s often a far cry from what seniors experience at this time of year.

Even if the elders in your sphere are in good health, they may be grieving a spouse or other loved one, concerned about dwindling finances if they’re unaware of the reverse mortgage option, or remembering holidays past, when life was very different.

Here are half a dozen simple, effective ways you can enhance a senior’s quality of life during the holiday season:

  1. Reach out and connect, or reconnect. It sounds almost too basic, yet is the easiest to overlook: call or visit a senior who could use the company. This might be someone who received a reverse mortgage loan several years ago, whom you haven’t spoken with in awhile. Be sure to bring a gift relevant to the person or couple in question, such as the pecan pie you know s/he loves, or a book by an author they enjoy. A half-hour visit might be a drop in the bucket in your busy day — and could be the highlight of the senior’s week or month.
  2. Talk about the past. Exploring happy memories not only reconnects elders with who they used to be in a positive way, it actually helps brighten the brain, and can be especially useful for people with mild cognitive impairment, who may more easily recall what transpired forty years ago than what took place last week.
  3. Send humorous greetings. Do you receive email forwards of bad jokes or cute animals? Email forwards have become increasingly popular among the silver set, now that technology is second nature, even for people in their 80s and 90s. In addition to sending snail-mail cards to your current reverse mortgage clients and prospects who aren’t (yet) online, consider sending e-cards to those prospects and clients who are digitally adept. A number of sites offer e-cards both as a paid subscriber and at no cost. American Greetings offers a free trial, and 123 Greetings offers some cards for free.
  4. Host a gathering. A holiday open house is a delightful way to show appreciation for clients, potential clients, referral resources and friends. Keep it simple and hold it during daylight hours, so it’s easier for seniors to get there (many no longer drive after dark). If possible, arrange for pick-up and return for those who would like to attend but do not have transportation. Your community may offer a Paratransit bus, or senior car service. Aim to serve healthy (and denture-friendly) finger foods, so you contribute to senior nutrition  — which has an effect on mood.
  5. Volunteer. Community service is especially welcome during the holidays, when extra hands and attentive ears are greatly valued. Your local senior center, or another community group that caters to older adults, will be grateful for any time you can devote to their members. Simply showing up and listening to seniors talk for an hour is a gift.
  6. Reduce your own stress. Finally, remember that we’re all affected by one another’s emotional state — particularly seniors who may already be feeling lonely, or who may have early-stage dementia. The more you can uplift your own state of mind during this season (meditation? yoga? walks in the park? playing with your kids or your dog?), the more peace and joy you’ll be able to bring into the lives of the seniors you serve.

Happy holidays!