Mr. Slumlord, A Gift From the Devil

The Mortgage Devil was a ruthless salesman and a horrible boss. When he wasn’t stealing loans from my commission statement he was bitching about the time I was demanding of him. He was a producer, vice president, and in title only, my manager. His management style was unique. One time he had me perform my own performance evaluation saying it was a management technique, yeah right, he was the Sultan of Spin. I knew he didn’t want to waste his time managing his loan officers, he wanted to be originating loans. What a dick.

After complaining profusely about the Devil stealing my loans to anyone who would listen but primarily to my operations manager, henceforth to be known as The Enabler, the Mortgage Devil called me to tell me he was giving me a loan. He was going on and on about how generous it was of him and how the agent on the deal was one of mine, so really it was only fair that I had the loan. It was a $70,000 loan meant as a peace offering to compensate me for the $500,000 in loans he had already taken from me.

What I think happened is that he stole the loan from me before I could talk to the customer. During the phone conversation with the Devil, I was perplexed as to why he didn’t just do the loan. Once I actually spoke to the customer it all became clear. This was not a gift, no, this was the Mortgage Devil pawning off a bat shit crazy customer on me because he figured that a $500 commission wasn’t going to be worth it. The Devil, appearing to be helpful, had once again screwed me.

I mentioned this customer in an earlier post on the habitual offenders, detailing the customers who became so prevalent in your life that it felt like you were in a relationship with them. A sick, twisted, stalk you till you die kind of relationship. This customer was working on becoming a slumlord and when I say he was a total pain in the ass, I am being generous. He was a vile and hot headed guy with an ego that was completely unjustified. To make matters worse, he suffered from delusions of grandeur about the real estate empire he was building in a sad little community that only had one thing going for it; it was thirty minutes from the ocean. His properties were targeted to low income people and he was awfully proud of all the Section 8 vouchers that would be paying for his bills.

That first loan for him was a nightmare and foreshadowed the torture I would endure during the next ten loans I did for him. Actually, it might have been more but I have probably blocked it out in an attempt to protect my sanity. Every one of his loans was either a no down payment or a very tiny down payment investment property loan, which are nightmares. He and I fought on a regular basis about the documentation he had to provide during the loan process. One time he told me he wasn’t going to give me something I needed and I said, “Fine, good luck finding enough money in your couch cushions to pay cash for the house.” He called back and apologized.

I was pregnant by the time I did his third loan and because I had a history of high risk pregnancy, I was sent to a specialist, a few hours away, for a series of tests and ultrasounds. I told the slumlord the day before that I would be unavailable and would be back in touch with him in 48 hours. During my ultrasound, my phone was vibrating so intently that my purse fell off the countertop. I left my doctor’s appointment and listened to 15 increasingly disturbing voicemails from Mr. Slumlord. I was pissed. I called him and told him again that I was taking a personal day and that if he called me and left me threatening messages one more time, I would never do a loan for him again. He hung up on me.

The Bank of Hell was so proud of its J.D. Power awards for customer service that every customer received a survey after their loan closed asking them to rate their experience. As luck should have it, Mr. Slumlord filled out his surveys for the previous loans I did for him in a fit of rage. He rated me horribly and wrote nasty comments about how I wouldn’t call him back. I shit you not, I talked to that guy nearly every single day of the week for one entire year.

I didn’t find out about the survey for months. You know how I found out about the survey, you guessed it, a phone call from the Mortgage Devil telling me that I was pulling down our branches ratings and I had some explaining to do. I was summoned to the main branch of the Mortgage Devil’s territory and read the riot act by the Enabler and the Devil himself. At some point, I interrupted them with a dismissive, “This is bullshit.” I explained that Mr. Slumlord was angry when I took a personal day and took it out on me by trashing me in the survey. I was also forced to point out that I currently had four loans in process for him. This is the remainder of that conversation:

Mortgage Devil: “He said in his survey that he would never come back to the Bank of Hell again so I think you better rethink your story.”

Turdy: “Here’s my pipeline report, he closes on Friday. I guess he came back because no one else wants to deal with him, I mean that is why you gave me his first loan right, you recognized what a pain in the ass he was.”

Mortgage Devil: “Well good, I guess this is resolved. Ask him not to fill out anymore surveys, ok?”

I left the meeting and called Mr. Slumlord and told him if he wanted his loans to close he had to promise to behave and not write anymore stupid stuff; he apologized. The next four surveys from him were glowing accounts of my talents as a loan officer and included flowery praise about the personal attention I gave his loans.

I still know Mr. Slumlord’s phone number having it burned into my frontal lobe by sheer repetition. I don’t know what happened to him or his properties. The properties could be in foreclosure or perhaps, he has been attacked by one of his poverty stricken tenants for leaving harassing messages, I cheer for the latter. I do know that not having to talk to him is one of the best parts of being out of the mortgage industry.

Note: I just remembered that the Mortgage Devil made me write a letter explaining my bad survey from Mr. Slumlord. This is what I remember:

To Whom it may Concern-

My customer, Mr. Slumlord, is crazy. He still calls me for loans constantly.

Best regards,
Turdy