Career moves

State Financial Network, Broomhall, Penn., a credit union-owned mortgage banking firm, has promoted Michael Magnavita, its chief financial officer, to the position of president and CEO. John Unangst, current president of the company who also heads nearby Franklin Mint Federal Credit Union, will continue to serve as chairman of the board. State Financial is a wholly owned CU Service Organizations for the $600 million credit union with a mortgage servicing portfolio of more than $500 million.

Chicago Bancorp, a retail mortgage banking company, has hired Jeffrey Walker as the new president of Chicago Bancorp Direct, its direct-to-consumer lending platform. Most recently he was with CitiMortgage Inc. where he was the managing director/executive vice president of national sales and lending. In his new role, Walker will be responsible for expanding the company's national footprint through Internet lending, call centers, and strategic partner relationships. He will be based in Chicago and assume his new responsibilities with the firm on May 1.

Blenn A. Fujimoto will now work full time as president and chief executive of Central Pacific HomeLoans Inc., the mortgage banking unit of Central Pacific Bank, Honolulu. He resigned the positions of vice chairman of parent company Central Pacific Financial Corp., and vice chairman, Hawaii market at Central Pacific Bank; those jobs have been eliminated as the company moves to a leaner management structure. Fujimoto was responsible for establishing CPHL in August 2005. In 2009, the company had origination volume of $1.9 billion in Hawaii.

The Private National Mortgage Acceptance Co. has named former Bank of America executive Steve Bailey as its chief servicing officer, effective immediately. In his new role, Bailey will oversee all mortgage servicing activities at PennyMac Loan Services, the servicing arm of PNMAC and its publicly traded vulture fund parent, Penny Mac Mortgage Investment Trust, Calabasas, Calif. At B of A he oversaw about $2 trillion in receivables. At Penny Mac he will oversee about $2 billion, a figure the company hopes to grow. However, the company hopes to enter the origination market shortly through a new conduit operation. To date, the firm has said little publicly about its conduit plans.

The Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association has appointed a former Federal Home Loan Bank president with extensive mortgage experience as the head of its securitization group. The new SIFMA appointee, Richard A. Dorfman, resigned Friday as president and chief executive officer of the Federal Home Loan Bank of Atlanta and was named to the SIFMA post on Monday. Jill Spencer, who has been the Federal Home Loan Bank of Atlanta's executive vice president and general counsel, was named interim president and chief executive officer following Dorfman's departure. Prior to joining the Federal Home Loan Bank of Atlanta in 2007, Dorfman was managing director and head of the U.S. agencies and mortgage business at ABN Amro. He also worked in Lehman Brothers' mortgage division as managing director and head of originations in its U.S. government and agencies business. In addition, he has been an attorney for the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and held positions at mortgage banking firms.

In a surprise move, Richard Dorfman, president of the Federal Home Loan Bank of Atlanta resigned effective Friday. Sources indicate his contract with the FHLB expires June 30 and the former Wall Street executive will be making an announcement soon about his future job plans. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Dorfman has landed a job with the Securities and Financial Markets Association. The FHLB's executive vice president and general counsel Jill Spencer has been named interim president and chief executive. "Our team successfully executed its mission during an unprecedented credit crisis and economic downturn. These events clearly displayed the value and importance of our institution," Mr. Dorfman said in statement issued by the Atlanta FHLB. He has served at the FHLB since 2007.

GMAC Financial Services has promoted Jeffrey Lemieux, a former executive at Cerberus Capital, to the position of senior vice president of business lending sales in its mortgage division. In his expanded role he will oversee customer relationships in the firm's correspondent channel and warehouse network under the auspices of the business lending/mortgage capital markets unit. Lemieux's promotion comes in the wake of several recent departures of top managers in the servicing department of Residential Capital Corp., GMAC's mortgage banking affiliate. Earlier this week, National Mortgage News broke the news that servicing executive John Vella had left the company to take a position with another firm. Prior to his promotion, Lemieux was senior vice president of fee based servicing and he retains these responsibilities managing the servicing capabilities that GMAC provides to third-party organizations. A few years back Cerberus paid $14 billion for a 51% stake in GMAC. Today, that stake has been reduced to just under 15%, leaving Cerberus with a massive paper loss on its investment. The U.S. Treasury is the largest stakeholder in GMAC with 56.3%. The company has hired Goldman Sachs to explore a sale of ResCap.

A few months after losing his job during a cost-cutting maneuver at GMAC, industry veteran Tony Renzi has landed at Freddie Mac and will be in charge of the GSE's efforts to minimize losses in its portfolio while dealing with its seller/servicers. Industry sources said Renzi also interviewed over at Fannie Mae. Bruce Witherell, Renzi's new boss at Freddie, said he could not comment on where else the former GMAC servicing executive interviewed but said, "We're happy to have him here at Freddie." The GSE created a new position for Renzi, who worked at GMAC for more than 20 years. He will hold the title of executive vice president, single-family portfolio management. Witherell, Freddie's chief operating officer, said Renzi "will be involved in all aspects of our decisions on the credit and default side," including the disposition of Freddie's REO holdings.

Craig Lipsay, the former head of securitized products at Morgan Stanley & Co., has been named managing partner at Loan Value Group LLC. During his 19 years on Wall Street, including a stint at Merrill Lynch, Lipsay worked in both residential and commercial with a focus on structured credit products. In his new role he will work with institutional clients to implement LVG's default deterrent for borrowers with negative equity positions. Lipsay will focus on the firm's Responsible Homeowner Reward program, which allows mortgage holders to make cash payments to select homeowners affected by negative equity that the borrowers will only receive if they remain current on their loans.

John Vella, executive vice president of portfolio servicing strategies for Residential Capital Corp., has resigned from the company, effective immediately, and is on the verge of taking a job with Fannie Mae, industry officials told National Mortgage News. At press time, Fannie Mae had not commented on the matter. According to a memo from GMAC mortgage chairman Tom Marano, Vella's duties will be given over to chief servicing officer Joe Pensabene. Vella joined the nation's sixth largest residential servicer in the fall of 2008. In his memo Marano said, "John provided leadership for our mortgage employees in Dallas, Carlsbad and Costa Mesa during a time of considerable change as we sought to reduce costs, and restructure and refocus our operations." Last month, NMN reported on the departure of about eight servicing managers at ResCap.

John Vella, executive vice president of portfolio servicing strategies for Residential Capital Corp., has resigned from the company, effective immediately, according to a memo provided to National Mortgage News. At press time, the GMAC-owned ResCap could not be reached for comment. According to a memo from GMAC mortgage chairman Tom Marano, Vella's duties will be given over to chief servicing officer Joe Pensabene. Vella joined the nation's sixth largest residential servicer in the fall of 2008. In his memo Marano said, "John provided leadership for our mortgage employees in Dallas, Carlsbad and Costa Mesa during a time of considerable change as we sought to reduce costs, and restructure and refocus our operations." Last month, NMN reported on the departure of about eight servicing managers at ResCap.

Meridian Capital Group LLC, one of the nation's largest commercial real estate mortgage brokerage firms, has hired industry veteran Marty Lanigan as senior managing director of origination and strategic initiatives. Among his duties, Lanigan will be responsible for overseeing the firm's origination efforts nationally. He will report to company president and CEO Ralph Herzka. During his career Lanigan has worked at Prudential Mortgage Capital Co., and GMAC Commercial Mortgage, among other firms. In 2001, he founded Mezz Cap, which eventually grew into a mid-market commercial mezzanine lender. The New York-based Meridian was founded by Herzka in 1991. To date it has placed more than $100 billion in commercial real estate debt.

Zions Bancorp, a top-ranked residential lender in Utah, named Kenneth Peterson executive vice president and chief credit officer, effective May 1. Peterson replaces Gerald Dent, who is retiring after 33 years with the company. Mr. Peterson joins Zions from Wells Fargo & Co. where he served as a chief credit officer for corporate credit and risk.

Reverse Mortgage Solutions Inc. promoted chief operating officer Marc Helm to president. Helm, a founding partner of the Spring, Texas-based firm, replaces Ken Austin, who is leaving the company to pursue personal interests, a company statement said. Helm joined RMS after a career of 30 years in the mortgage-servicing sector. He is a former senior officer at Washington Mutual, where he was responsible for helping WaMu integrate all loan servicing acquisitions into its system. In addition, RMS hired Michael Clendennen as chief financial officer and Michael Kent as senior vice president of portfolio retention. Clendennen has served the past eight years as vice president and controller at Allied Home Mortgage Capital Corp., Houston. Kent has over 28 years of experience with regional and national lending institutions, including several senior management and executive positions. For the past eight years, he has owned and operated mortgage and real estate sales companies in Los Gatos, Calif.

Radian Guaranty Inc., the mortgage insurance subsidiary of Radian Group Inc. has appointed Brian Frame to the be director, strategic segment manager. In his new role, Frame will be responsible for expanding Radian's relationships with credit unions across the United States by working with the company's national field sales team to promote Radian products and programs. He will also represent Radian at state credit union league meetings and other credit union conferences. In addition, Frame will participate on the ACUMA Membership Committee and interface with a variety of loan origination system providers to expand Radian's connectivity within the electronic mediums that credit unions work with each day. Prior to his new appointment, Frame served as a senior account manager with Radian, responsible for client accounts throughout the state of Wisconsin. He has been actively involved with the mortgage banking and insurance industries for the past 25 years.

HOPE LoanPort, the new counselor Web-based tool that streamlines submission of completed loan modification applications, including those used for the Home Affordable Modification Program, has named six people to serve on its board of directors. The organization also named its CEO. There are plans to expand the Board in the near future to reflect the diversity of the organizations involved with this web portal initiative. Larry Gilmore, currently the deputy director of the HOPE NOW Alliance, will assume the day-to-day management of HOPE LoanPort. The following individuals will make up the board of directors: William Longbrake, an executive in residence at the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland where he works on a variety of business, policy and governance issues; John Dalton, former Secretary of the Navy in the Clinton administration; John Courson, the president and CEO of the Mortgage Bankers Association; Faith Schwartz, the executive director of HOPE NOW; Kenneth Wade, the CEO of NeighborWorks America, a public nonprofit corporation established as the Neighborhood Reinvestment Corp. by an Act of Congress in 1978; and Camillo Melchiorre, senior vice president of loss management for Radian Guaranty Inc.

Fairway Independent Mortgage Corp., Sun Prairie, Wis., has promoted Paul Walnick from senior vice president of information technology to president of mortgage operations and Dan Cutaia from chief operating officer to president of capital markets and risk management. Walnick will oversee Fairway's day-to-day mortgage business and underwriting operations while providing branch and product support. Cutaia will oversee the overhaul of Fairway's loan origination platform, as well as all technical and compliance related issues, systems and secondary business. In 2009, Fairway closed $3.3 billion in mortgage volume, a 70% increase from the prior year. Steve Jacobson remains as chief executive. Walnick has held sales management positions at both Waterfield Financial Corp., and American Home Mortgage, where he oversaw retail sales production in Texas and Arizona. Cutaia was the founder and former president of Aucita Mortgage Capital and held executive positions with Waterfield Financial, where he oversaw numerous infrastructure initiatives involving post production and delivery, and product and credit risk.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch has hired Wall Street veteran Steve Harris as managing director in charge of mortgage sales for its Americas division. Harris will report to Michael Hokin, head of America's mortgages and securitized product sales at the bank. According to StructuredFinanceNews.com, Hokin-who was formerly head of global securitized markets sales at Citigroup-joined Bank of America Merrill last September. Prior to his hiring, Harris had a six-month stint at Rafferty Capital as a manager in structured products. From 1987 to 2009 he worked for Goldman Sachs as a manager in mortgage sales.

General Growth Properties, Chicago, one of the largest commercial REITs in the nation, said director Glen Rufrano has resigned from its board. In a new SEC filing, the company said his departure "is not due to any disagreement between Mr. Rufrano" and the company. General Growth is a real estate investment trust that invests and owns shopping malls, master planned communities, and other CRE assets.

Jefferies & Co. named Mark Green as a managing director and head of CMBS capital markets. Green will report jointly to William Jennings and Johan Eveland, co-heads of Jefferies' MBS/ABS group, as well as Benjamin Lorello, global head of investment banking and capital markets at Jefferies. According to a report in Asset Securitization Report, Green will become part of a team consisting of Joe Accurso and Lisa Pendergast, who co-head CMBS trading and strategy, and Dana Arrighi who heads CRE origination. Green has 11 years of CMBS capital markets experience and joins Jefferies from UBS, where for four years he was a managing director and head of CMBS capital markets. "With the ongoing rebound in capital markets activity, there is an even greater need and demand from our clients for innovative financing and ideas," Jennings and Eveland said. The company views the CMBS market as a major investment banking opportunity this year. Asset Securitization Report is an affiliate of National Mortgage News.