Largest Reverse Mortgage Lender Getting Bigger via M&A Deal

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Former Tennessee Senator and potential Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson speaks at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Annual Convention, Aug. 21, 2007, in Kansas City, Missouri. Photographer: Dick Whipple/Bloomberg News

The nation's largest reverse mortgage lender, American Advisors Group, is developing a retail channel where its loan officers meet their customers face-to-face.

Up until recently, the Orange, Calif., lender relied on a centralized call center and its wholesale lending channel to originate Federal Housing Administration-insured reversed mortgages. Now it is has agreed to acquire Associated Mortgage Bankers' reverse mortgage platform for an undisclosed price.

AMB, based in Garden City, N.Y., has a call center and retail "feet on the street" sales force that will be working for AAG, which will retain AMB's reverse mortgage leadership team, with Kevin Blakeney leading national field sales.

"The AMB acquisition further solidifies our plan to scale our newest retail channel while leveraging the infrastructure and resources AAG has available," Reza Jahangiri, chief executive of American Advisors Group, said in a press release issued Feb. 12.

When the deal is complete, which is expected by April 1, 85 of AMB's employees will be on AAG's payroll, which will bring the company's employee count up to nearly 800.

In December, AAG took on 45 employees from Reverse Mortgage USA in Austin, Texas.

AAG originates upwards of 1,000 FHA-insured reverse mortgages a month. Former Sen. Fred Thompson is the company's television spokesman.

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