Countrywide Home Loans Reviews

Pros

At the time I was employed at Countrywide Home Loans, it was a highly respected company and one of the top originators of A-Paper and subprime loans.

Cons

Their lax underwriting guidelines for subprime loans resulted in a lot of defaulted loans because upper management were pressured into meeting their monthly & quarterly quotas.

Advice to Senior Management

The company as a whole was a great company to work for, but it's rapid growth and demand to perform to Wall Street's expectations caused a lot of speculation as to the risk it was taking underwriting and approving many of their subprime loans.

Pros

Good salary. Overpaid for amount of work that is required of you! They could hire high school kids for alot of jobs at a lot lower pay but they help keep industry averages up with the salaries! good for Alot of peon positions!

Cons

No one knows what is going on. 3 of us started a week ago and were already let go today!!! Nothing to do. Said they are overstaffed after hiring all 3 of us. I actually had a job I loved that I left for this that was supposed to be temp to perm in 2 months. How stupid was I in this market and economy!!! Marketing material all says Bank of America now but it is the same old Countrywide!!! Still very outdated system and technology compared to other leaders in industry! Customer Service is rude to people! No training programs in place for any positions. Higher pay for this market but remember "money does not buy happiness" or job security.

Advice to Senior Management

Up-date technology. Update hardware and systems. Get managers that have some knowledge. Lower level employees know more than"leader" or whatever they are calling them this week. Overstaffed-employees could do alot more than they are assigned to. Basically lazy attitudes.

Pros

Opportunities for advancement, exposure to technology. Exposure to mortgage industry.

Cons

current mortgage market - - company reputation suffered damage. thousands of employees laid off through no fault of their own.

Advice to Senior Management

analyze carefully what went wrong in industry to avoid happening again.

Pros

CHL invests a lot of time and $ training employees, through mentoring, career pathing, project management, promotional opportunities, and many other leadership development opportunities, such as Franklin-Covey training opportunities, shared sessions, information sessions, and even toastmasters memberships. On-site state of the art exercise facilities, training teams, and cafeterias promote health, and are convenient and safe. Offices are aesthetically, and ergonomically comfortable, and safe.

Cons

Countrywide ships work overseas, so there is always the possibility of losing your job & no security. Shipping jobs overseas, culture of severe politics and not family oriented. Never over promise and under deliver. This happens quite often with Countrywide, where promotion and growth opportunities are forecasted and planned poorly and then rolled out to the staff before the infrastructure is in place to handle. Downsizing and poor upper management decisions & lack of cost effective measures/overspending results in lost jobs. Need to spend less, recognize more, and less of a popularity competition between management.

Advice to Senior Management

Hold 1st and senior VP's accountable for living the seven principles, and for creating a culture of discipline, recognition, and honesty by requiring managers to submit reviews on them and their style and effectiveness of feedback. Are they REALLY creating the culture you always rave about?

Pros

Many divisions, large, opportunity for interdepartmental transfer.

Cons

Disparate treatment by some managers. Overworked employees.

Advice to Senior Management

Take more time to listen to the average worker.

Pros

A large company that potentially has a lot of opportunites. BofA still has clout in the industry. You get exposure to many things that otherwise would not be available. A lot of exposure to crisis management. Plenty of free parking. The cafeterias are pretty good. Most sites have workout facilities.

Cons

It favors process over people. The financial sector is currently out of favor. The transition with BofA is still in progress and a risky proposition for many associates.

Advice to Senior Management

Try to hang onto the good talent that built Countrywide into a loan production and servicing machine.

Pros

The money and being able to help people at one point. Also the benefits were very very very good. They covered everything and were pretty cheap. The people that worked there were always pretty nice, at least the people that worked there for some time. The people they started hiring just to fill seats were there to just rip people off and make money.

Cons

they promoted people that didn't know what they were doing but because they liked them. Like I said, the insurance was very very good, that was until you need something big and you were out of work. Then they would deny you anything and maybe face getting written up for missing any work. Even with sick time because you were supposed to live there to make the managers and the managers managers money. They didn't care about you in the long run. There was always another of you that wanted to make money.

Advice to Senior Management

learn your job

Pros

Aligned with Bank of America. A very strong company

Cons

Every company has a downside. It depends on the team you work with.

Advice to Senior Management

Give clear directives and stick with them. Too much changing of direction causes confusion among employees.

Pros

$150K pay mostly commissions. The monthly draw was $2500.

Cons

The micro-managment mentality. Managager timed your bathroom break. He knew it would only take 2mins. On the 3rd minute he would be waiting at your desk asking why so long. It was very stressfull

Advice to Senior Management

Put yourself in the employees shoes before you speak. To many senior management employees with no knowledge of leadership skills. You must realize we see everything. If you are not ethical we do not respect you and we do not take ownership for our work.

Pros

Ability to originate loans nationwide, Reverse Mortgages, flexibility with pricing, processing systems, lots of leads right now because I speak Spanish

Cons

Compensation isn't the greatest, and it gets worse when I refi friends and family who are current Countrywide customers, even though Countrywide didn't provide the lead.

Advice to Senior Management

Having a production assistant in each branch would be very helpful to help us focus on finding more loans. Our region's policy is that each LO must be closing $3M each month to get their own assistant. Why not provide one assistant for multiple LO's as we work towards that mark? I don't mind working extra hours, but I'd rather not be doing busy work. I'd rather be generating more leads.