_edited.png)
We are on a quest to transform the mortgage industry.
We believe there needs to be more transparency, which is one reason why we decided to share a monthly report on what we have learned, what worked and what didn’t, and what’s next in our plans to grow a Billion Dollar Brokerage.
We hope you find a few useful ideas and tidbits to help you in growing your mortgage business.
Welcome to December 2023
Brokerage Stats
Production since August 1, 2021
Volume: $1,088,753,684
Files funded: 2,500
November Production
Volume: $71,441,238
Files funded: 186
November Agent Stats
Rookies: 118 (-3)
Pros: 106 (+9)
Total: 224
100% True Commission Splits
You have probably seen ads for mattress companies, promising to beat or match another company’s price if you can find the same product.
Here’s the thing.
Even if two or more companies had the exact same mattress, you would never be able to tell.
That’s because mattress manufacturers make the same model for each company but change the fabric and the name, making it nearly impossible to compare one company’s product to another’s.
This is an underhanded way to make a false guarantee, and unfortunately, it happens in the mortgage industry too.
Let me explain.
I was recently talking to an agent, who told me she thought she was on a 70/30 split. However, when she got her first commission check and started to do the math, something didn’t add up.
What her managing broker failed to mention was that there was a 5.65% royalty and a 5% brokerage split prior to her 70/30 split.
When she did the math, she was actually on a 62.74% split.
Here is a breakdown of the numbers, based on a $400,000 file with TD that earns 75 BPS Finders Fee and 35 BPS of Volume Bonus.
Now, if a brokerage wants to charge royalties and a brokerage fee, I'm totally okay with that. Everyone can run their business in any way they see fit.
However, just like the mattress companies, I see too many broker owners making claims about their splits but omitting critical details, making it difficult for agents to compare compensation from one brokerage to the next.
When it comes to compensation, we believe in clarity, which led us to adopt what we call a “100% True Commission Split Policy.”
What exactly is our 100% True Commission Split Policy?
We do this because we think that transparency matters. We also believe that brokerage owners should behave better than mattress companies.
As a side note, the quickest way to find out if you are being kept in the dark is to ask your BDM if they are allowed to discuss how ALL compensation works.
How BRX Agents Can Earn Stock Options
At BRX, we love our agents, and want them to be able to participate in our growth, which is why we have created our BRX Stock Option Awards to reward agents who are helping us grow.
How does it work?
A Pro agent can earn up to 1,500 stock options in a year by meeting the following three requirements:
Capping Award = 500 stock options
Cultural Award = 500 stock options
Collaboration Award = 500 stock options
Note: An agent must cap in order to be able to participate in the Cultural and Collaboration awards.
What is the Capping Award?
At BRX Mortgage, our Pros have an 85/15 commission split until they reach their annual cap of $15,000. Upon reaching the annual cap, they are rewarded with 500 company stock options.
What is the Cultural Award?
Once an Agent caps, they are eligible to earn an additional 500 stock options by achieving the two milestones below:
Attend at least one live BRX Event in the calendar year.
Attend 75% of the monthly Town Hall meetings.
What is the Collaboration Award?
An agent who has capped is also eligible to earn an additional 500 stock options by participating as an approved monthly trainer or coach for BRX.
All stock options have a three-year vesting period, and are contingent upon maintaining good standing with the company and the regulator.
Stock Option Challenges
Also, from time to time, BRX Mortgage will offer stock options to agents for helping us meet specific and measurable company objectives.
The details of the specifics of how these Stock Option Challenges work will be shared in writing inside the agent portal and announced on the live Town Hall calls.
These stock options also have a three-year vesting period.
How to Predict the Future, Sort of
Wouldn’t it be great to predict the future?
I know we can’t, but we can use a Leading Indicator to give us a clue as to what will be in our pipeline in the next 60 to 90 days.
A Leading Indicator is something you can measure today that may help you to predict future results.
A trick I learned from another broker owner was to measure the number of credit pulls as a way of predicting future mortgage production.
As I thought this made a lot of sense, I decided to analyze our last 12 months, to determine the ratio of credit pulls to funded files within the next 30 days.
You likely noticed that there is no result in the first two rows. This is because I am making the assumption that most mortgages do not fund within 30 days of pulling credit, but are probably closer to 60 days from the credit pull.
Example:
October 2022 had 360 Equifax pulls, and 60 days later, in December 2022, we funded 60 files. That works out to be 360/6 = 6.0 files funded/60 days.
The number of pulls per funded file does vary, but the average over the past 12 months is 5.27.
This indicates that, for every 5.27 credit pulls, we will fund one file in 60 days. I have experimented with files funded in 30 days and 90 days, but found that 60 days seemed slightly more accurate.
Hey, it’s not an exact science, but it is a shorthand way to help us predict future volume. :)
For example, if I want to know how many files we can expect to fund in January of 2024, I would simply take the number of pulls in November (794) and divide that by our average (5.27).
January Prediction:
794 credit pulls / 5.27 average = 151 estimated files funded *
You may also notice that the number of credit pulls required to fund a file has actually gone down over the past 12 months, going from 6.00 in December of 2022 to only 4.95 credit pulls per funded file in November of 2023.
I think there is a reasonable explanation for this.
In December of 2022, we had primarily Rookie agents. Rookie agents are usually going to have a lower closing ratio on leads. Since then, we have added 57 pro agents.
I believe this has lowered the average number of pulls per funded file.
I don’t know that we will get much lower, but I suspect that an experienced broker, with a large database of past clients, is probably going to have a ratio that is in the low 4s or even 3s.
I am curious to know if you have done this for your business. If so, message me your number of funded files per credit pull 60 days out here.
***Note: Once we see how many files we fund in January of 2024, I will update this blog post, to see how accurate it is.
Comments