What did you do to celebrate Thanksgiving?  We had a great weeklong time with immediate and extended family in Gatlinburg TN.  We have done this for several years now and it is becoming somewhat of a tradition.  I know from my families’ perspective we absolutely LOVE meeting everyone in Gatlinburg…

You may have read recently that David Green, the 80-year-old owner and founder of Hobby Lobby gave his company away.  He is putting it all into a trust and will not be handing it down to his children or grandchildren. “Wealth can be a curse and, in most cases, if you…

I work remotely most of the time.  I do have face-to-face meetings regularly across the city with different business partners and families but most of the time I work from home. Last week we had a sales meeting at our office that brought most of the local/remote folks to our office. …

I spent the last week with my family on vacation. It was the last Fall Break with my 12th grade son! (Sad oh my!)  We went with my wife’s parents via car to Chicago for a couple of days and then on to the Wisconsin Dells. Devon and I have…

Things are just flat out difficult in my business right now.  Interest rates are higher than they have been in the last 2 years and have increased faster than we have seen in some time.  People are timid when it comes to leaving their recently refinanced 2.5% mortgage for a different house…

I had a customer treat me very unkindly this week. They didn’t like the fact that I told them they didn’t qualify yet for a home loan.  They wanted me to approve them anyway when in reality they just didn’t have everything quite in order yet for me to do…

I’ve dealt with a few interesting customers over the last several weeks.  After my teammate and I asked politely but firmly the 8th time for a document we needed less than a week before closing the family told me: “You just don’t want us to get into this house do you?”. The…

I’m trying a lot harder this year at my job.  But what does trying harder really mean? In year one of my new career I worked a lot of hours.  Since it was all so new to me it took me longer to do some of the common things a Loan Officer…

What drives you to do what you do everyday at work? Is it the thrill of being productive?  The money?   The thought of helping others?  Or is it just a “job” and there is no motivation except for the fact that we all have to pay our bills so this is…

Friday was a good day for me.  It felt very productive!  I started out my day with a list of things to do.  This may sound mundane to write about, but for some reason when I have a to do list at the start of the day it makes the…