Wendy Tippie, mortgage consultant
By Douglas Wu

Purchasing a first home mortgage, a second home mortgage or home equity lines of credit can be a daunting task for American families.

Fortunately Columbus residents have the option of turning to Wendy Tippie, a home loan consultant for Countrywide Home Loans. She can use Countrywide Home Loans’ wide range of first home mortgages, second home mortgages and home equity lines of credit to help customers find the right loans for their situations. “I’m pretty flexible,” Tippie said.

Some of her customers are from Columbus’s Asian community. Tippie said she has worked with Asian real estate agents and that led her to advertise her services to the community.

Tippie works in Countrywide Home Loans’ Worthington office. Countrywide Home Loans also has offices in Gahanna and Hilliard. Countrywide Home Loans, founded in 1969 by two New York bankers, has 600 branches nationwide.

Tippie said recently the prime interest rate has increased due to the Federal Reserve’s decision to raise short-term interest rates.

However, she said the increase in the prime interest rate has not affected her business. “Not really, my business has remained pretty steady,” Tippie said.

The business has decreased somewhat compared to last year when many people took advantage of low interest rates to purchase home mortgages, home equity lines of credit and refinance existing home mortgages, she said. “As far as I’m concerned it’s still going,” Tippie said.

Tippie has been in the home loan business for eight years as of this fall and four years with Countrywide Home Loans. She said Countrywide Home Loans is an excellent company to work for due to its wide range of home loan financial products and its excellent employee training programs. “They’re good at keeping us up-to-date as to what’s going on,” Tippie said.

She works in the industry because she wants to help people navigate the complicated process associated with purchasing home loans. “The whole reason I started is because I wanted to help people,” Tippie said.

Tippie recommended that someone who is interested in a career in home loans obtain a college finance degree if possible.

People interested in purchasing home mortgages and home equity lines of credit can come to her office for a free consultation, Tippie said.

She said potential clients tell her their purpose for the home mortgages and home equity lines of credit and their financial goals and then she explains their options to them.

Tippie advises people looking for their first homes talk to her first and obtain pre-approval letters before talking to real estate agents.

She said the purpose of pre-approval letters is to give first-time homebuyers an idea of their borrowing power.

The first step in the pre-approval process is the credit report that sometimes can be stressful for people looking for home loans, Tippie said. “Unfortunately, that’s the first step with any lender you’re talking to,” she said.

The average time it takes for Tippie to issue a pre-approval letter is fairly short. “Normally, I can issue a pre-approval letter within a day,” she said.

Tippie said in the past people had to save money for down payments on home mortgages. However, Tippie said, in some situations people can obtain home mortgages without down payments. “Now we can do it with no down payment,” she said. “We’ve come a long way.”