2014 MBA Annual Convention and Expo: Las Vegas Edition

The mortgage industry is a heavily regulated business. We make it our goal to stay up-to-date on these regulations. Our Chief Compliance Officer, Rob Green, and our Operations Manager, Brock Walradth, just got back from the 2014 MBA Annual Convention and Expo held October 19th-22nd.

After they returned, I sat down with Rob to find out what he learned in Las Vegas.

Q&A with Rob Green

Question: How was your visit to Las Vegas and how was the conference overall?

Rob: It was a very busy conference for us. The MBA Annual is probably the biggest of all the conferences I’ve ever been to. MBA does quite a few conferences throughout the year, but this one is by far the most attended. I believe the number of attendees was a little over 4,000 people.

As for Las Vegas, going to Las Vegas is never bad. There were some pre-conference meetings which started on Sunday, but the actual conference started on Monday morning. To kickoff the conference actor Kevin Spacey was interviewed by MBA Chairman, Bill Cosgrove and shared some very interesting stories from his career.

Question: Can you share what was discussed and what sessions you attended?

Rob: It wasn’t as session heavy or content heavy as others, but there was still a lot of good information. The first session I attended was led by the MBA’s Regulatory Compliance Committee and also included two members of the CFPB. This discussion covered two main concerns MBA had with the CFPB.

Question: So that must have gotten fairly heated. What was the MBA’s first concern?

Rob: Yes, it ended up being quite a heated debate. The first concern addressed the proposal coming from the CFPB. In July of this year, the CFPB proposed to add a policy to display to the public unstructured and unsubstantiated narratives, or comments, from anyone to the CFPB’s Consumer Complaint Database. The MBA Regulatory Compliance Committee mentioned quite a few “key points” in their message to the CFPB staff detailing why this proposal would not be in the best interest of any party involved.

Question: So why wouldn’t this proposal be good for either party?

Rob: If a lender decides to respond to any of the unsubstantiated postings, the lender may risk a consumer’s privacy by inadvertently disclosing non-public personal information.

The second key point discussed how unsubstantiated complaints could cause financial and reputational harm to lenders. The MBA made it clear they believe the proposal should be opened up for public comment if the proposal is to be considered further.

Question: What was the other concern they had with the CFPB?

Rob: Their second concern dealt with all the great tools the CFPB has developed to assist the industry in their understanding of the rules and implementation of them in to every day processes. The concern of the committee is with the disclaimer on all the tools stating they can’t be used for “official use.” The MBA’s stance is “What good are those tools if we can’t use them or refer to them as guidance?”

Question: What were the biggest things that stood out to you at this conference?

Rob: MBA did a salute to the military and gave away 5 homes to the military members who have been injured in the war. I just thought, how incredible it is to give something so life changing to someone who was permanently injured fighting for our rights and freedom.

Question: Was this the last conference for this year?

Rob: No, I have a conference in Hawaii from November 4^th-7^th. At this conference different companies’ staff members meet up, some are compliance officers or equivalent, and we work together for three or four days to brainstorm the details of policies and procedures. The conference gives us the ingredients for creating policies and procedures specific to GVC Mortgage, Inc.