Director of Mortgage

Description

Position Overview:

The Director of Mortgage provides leadership for mortgage underwriting, loan fulfillment, operations, secondary marketing, loan servicing, quality control, and regulatory compliance. Reporting to the Vice President of Mortgage, this position is responsible for ensuring mortgage loans are prudently underwritten, accurately and efficiently processed, closed and serviced, eligible for the intended execution, and managed in accordance with Credit Union policy, investor and agency requirements, and applicable federal and state laws and regulations. The Director serves as the primary mortgage operations and compliance subject-matter expert, provides management oversight of the Manager Mortgage Operations, and builds the leadership breadth, strategic judgment, and department knowledge necessary to support continuity and future advancement within mortgage leadership.

Essential Functions:

• Partner with the Vice President of Mortgage and senior leadership to execute the Credit Union’s mortgage strategy, operating plan, risk appetite, service standards, and financial objectives.
• Provide day-to-day leadership and oversight for mortgage underwriting, processing, fulfillment, closing, post-closing, secondary marketing, investor delivery, servicing, quality control, and compliance.
• Lead, coach, evaluate, and develop the Manager Mortgage Operations; establish clear performance expectations and ensure effective leadership, staffing, training, cross-training, succession readiness, and accountability throughout mortgage operations.
• Serve as the senior mortgage credit authority within assigned lending limits. Underwrite or provide final review of complex, high-risk, exception, jumbo, government, portfolio, correspondent, and investor-deliverable mortgage loans as appropriate.
• Ensure underwriting decisions are consistent, supportable, timely, and compliant with Credit Union policy, delegated authority, automated underwriting findings, investor overlays, and applicable agency or government program requirements.
• Maintain current expertise in conventional, portfolio, jumbo, FHA, VA, USDA, FHLB/MPF, and other mortgage products offered by the Credit Union, including documentation, eligibility, appraisal, insurance, closing, delivery, and servicing requirements.
• Oversee the complete mortgage fulfillment lifecycle from application through disclosure, processing, underwriting, closing, funding, post-closing, delivery, boarding, and servicing transfer or retention.
• Establish and monitor service-level expectations, production capacity, pipeline aging, turn times, suspense conditions, closing accuracy, trailing documents, delivery deadlines, member communications, and operational quality.
• Ensure mortgage systems, workflows, documentation, data interfaces, imaging, and controls support accurate, efficient, secure, and compliant operations. Lead process improvement and implementation of new systems, products, programs, and investor relationships.
• Provide oversight of secondary marketing activities.
• Oversee retained and released mortgage servicing activities, including loan boarding, payment processing, escrow administration, adjustable-rate changes, payoff and satisfaction processing, mortgage insurance administration, tax and insurance monitoring, member notices, delinquency referral, error resolution, and servicing transfers.
• Ensure mortgage servicing vendors and subservicers meet contractual, regulatory, service, data-security, business-continuity, and performance expectations. Review reporting, exceptions, complaints, and corrective actions.
• Own mortgage compliance governance in partnership with Compliance and other control functions. Translate legal, regulatory, agency, investor, and examination changes into documented policy, procedures, system requirements, controls, training, testing, and management reporting.
• Maintain expert working knowledge of laws and regulations applicable to mortgage origination and servicing, including the ECOA/Reg B, TILA/Reg Z, RESPA/Reg X, HMDA/Reg C, Fair Housing Act, FCRA, SAFE Act, flood insurance requirements, appraiser independence requirements, Homeowners Protection Act, SCRA, privacy requirements, and UDAP standards.
• Serve as the business owner for HMDA data integrity and reporting. Maintain documented HMDA governance, reportable-loan and action-taken decision rules, data ownership, edit checks, exception resolution, geocoding controls, quarterly monitoring, annual Loan/Application Register reconciliation and submission, disclosure obligations, and retention requirements.
• Coordinate periodic HMDA data reviews and fair lending monitoring; identify data-quality issues, outliers, disparities, root causes, training needs, and corrective actions, and escalate material concerns promptly to the Vice President of Mortgage, Chief Lending Officer, and Compliance.
• Develop and maintain a risk-based mortgage quality-control program covering pre-funding and post-closing reviews, reverifications, appraisal quality, data accuracy, fraud indicators, compliance testing, investor defects, early payment defaults, servicing controls, and corrective-action tracking.
• Lead mortgage responses to federal and state examinations, internal and external audits, investor reviews, agency recertifications, quality-control reviews, and compliance testing. Maintain organized and complete evidence of controls and remediation.
• Prepare clear and timely reports and recommendations for the Vice President of Mortgage and leadership.
• Collaborate with Lending, Compliance, Risk, Legal, Finance, Accounting, Business Intelligence, Technology, Branch Operations, Marketing, and external partners to protect the Credit Union and improve mortgage performance and member experience.
• Provide regular training and guidance to mortgage personnel on underwriting, operational, investor, servicing, HMDA, fair lending, and other compliance requirements. Promote a culture in which employees raise concerns and resolve errors promptly.
• Maintain the highest level of confidentiality regarding member, employee, vendor, investor, and proprietary Credit Union information.
• Adhere to Bank Secrecy Act requirements and all Credit Union policies and procedures, applicable federal and state laws and regulations.
• Complete other duties and strategic assignments commensurate with the position.

Requirements

Qualifications/Skills:

• Bachelor’s degree in business, finance, economics, or a related field required; an equivalent combination of relevant education and experience may be considered.
• Minimum of eight years of mortgage lending experience, including substantial recent experience in mortgage underwriting, fulfillment, operations, secondary marketing, servicing, compliance, and/or quality assurance/quality control.
• Minimum of five years of management experience in a full-service financial institution or mortgage banking environment.
• Demonstrated ability to lead managers and teams, develop employees, manage performance, and build effective succession and continuity plans.
• Advanced knowledge of mortgage underwriting, loan documentation, closing, post-closing, investor delivery, secondary marketing, and mortgage servicing requirements.
• Advanced knowledge of HMDA/Regulation C and mortgage-related federal and state compliance requirements, with demonstrated experience establishing controls, testing data, resolving exceptions, and supporting regulatory examinations or audits.
• Strong working knowledge of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, FHA, VA, USDA, FHLB/MPF, and portfolio lending guidelines and automated underwriting systems.
• Strong analytical and financial skills, including the ability to evaluate credit risk, operational data, compliance findings, secondary-market execution, servicing performance, and emerging trends.
• Excellent judgment, creative problem-solving, and decision-making skills with the ability to make sound, well-documented decisions in complex, sensitive, or high-pressure situations.
• Excellent written and verbal communication, training, presentation, and relationship-management skills; able to explain complex requirements clearly and influence stakeholders at all levels.
• Experience with mortgage loan origination, pricing engine, automated underwriting, document, imaging, secondary-market, servicing, reporting, and compliance systems.
• Ability and willingness to travel to Credit Union locations, training, conferences, examinations, and business meetings as business needs require.