This is Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stenovic on Bloomberg Radio. So we had some housing data today.
Sales had previously owned US homes falling in March by more than forecasts, really underscoring a housing market that's still on shaky footing despite some signs of stabilizing. And then we had some data earlier this week that showed single family home building climbing to a three month high in March. We're just trying to make sense of it all, Maddie. And then we had a thirty year fixed rate mortgage averaging six point three nine percent out of April twentieth.
That was some data that came out yesterday from Freddie Mac actually today forgive me. And then the thirty year rows after dropping for five straight weeks. So I feel like there's conflicting stories when it comes to housing and what's going on. Our next guest, So has a great window and vantage point into the mortgage park market. His company worked with fifteen of the top twenty five banks and lenders in the US.
So here to get an update.
On what they are seeing and what they are doing.
Is Joe Well you.
He's founder and CEO of the fintach's fintech software platform, Total Expert. Here at our Bloomberg Interactive Broker's studio.
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome, How.
Are you great? Thanks for having me, appreciate the opportunity.
Well, it's great to have you here, and you do come at this from a different point. Remind everybody who's listening and watching on Bloomberg what you guys do specifically and who you.
Are sure sure so. Total Expert is a technology company that caters specifically to the financial services industry, and at a high level, the core of our technology is designed to help banks, lenders, modern financial services firms build really high quality, long term relationships with customers.
What does that mean?
It really means understanding the consumer, using data to ultimately understand not just at a transactional level, but really going deep to understand holistically all of the financial needs and wants of a consumer so they can give higher quality advice throughout the entire financial journey, a consumer's entire financial journey.
Can I ask how you figure that out? Is it AI or.
Well, you know, we do use AI certainly, and it's an evolution and ultimately we partner with some amazing firms, some of the largest banks, independent mortgage companies, and credit unions in the country, and through that partnership, we evolve our technology to solve some of the needs they have in the business.
And which type of clients do you mainly work with and.
Some Yeah, we work with credit unions, banks, independent mortgage banks, and insurance firms.
So like your big big guys that have been reporting this week.
Yes, a few of those. I won't mention any names, but we have multiple banks in the top five. And then we have if you think of the top couple one hundred lenders in the country, we work with a large percentage of those.
So what are you hearing are the biggest concerns then from the customers in terms of the data that you have.
Yeah, So I think as a general rule of financial services industry, particularly lending, is going through this shift to where they really understand it is about long term relationships
with consumers. And in order to earn the right to have those long term relationships, you really have to be able to deliver value to those customers in a way that treats them as a unique individual human that has certain financial goals and it should be about not just doing a transaction, but ultimately about financial fitness and really holistically helping them achieve their goals over time, such as home ownership as an example.
So did the collapse of three regionals impact that? And is that what you're kind of addressing or was that going on prior to that?
So I think that some of that is there's some macro things that were happening there certainly that cause those and we of course are in the mix all the time, and I think there's a lot of there's a lot of caution with the regional banks right now and understanding that, but ultimately we saw a brief amount of dislocation where consumers were concerned, and then ultimately we don't see much
of that at this point. We ultimately see the banks, lenders, credit unions, organizations, we work with, independent mortgage banks well really leaning into help their customers kind of navigate. Probably the most unstable financial time we've had in fifteen years, is any.
Of the advice that you're giving hitting on increasing savings, accounts yields. Because we were just talking about people flying from the traditional banks, some of them I imagine.
You work with to those high Yeah, so there is some of that strategy, and ultimately it really goes back to understanding at a consumer level. I need to look at not just what I want to sell this customer, but I need to look at their entire financial picture
and what's important to them. Right, So, as an example, how savings accounts are certainly something that's important to consumers, and in the organizations that we partner with are ultimately trying to say, you know, how do we become the best financial partner to this consumer and serve them in the products and services that those institutions Ultimately.
So, based on the data that you see and the companies that you work with, what are you seeing about lending activity? And we're coming off just a period where we've heard from a lot of the banks, so we know a lot, But what are you seeing in terms of lending activity, whether it's individuals, whether it's to businesses, and signs that maybe things are indeed slowing down.
So I think there's really two angles you have to look at it with. So there, certainly we're in an environment where rates have went up at a greater pace than at almost any time in modern history. Okay, and so that's one side of the equation. The other side of the equation is the demand that we're seeing on
the lending side is actually incredibly high. What's happening, though, is there's on the housing market specifically, we do a lot of our organizations we work with do lending for people purchasing homes, mortgages, and as well as home equity lending. We see a lot of appetite for demand for those types of loans. Where there's a gap is inventory, there's
not as many homes on the market. And also you're also seeing an adjustment period to where consumers that we're looking at, say a five hundred thousand dollars home maybe a couple of years ago, and they had aspirations of being in a five hundred thousand dollars home, Well now they have to look at a home that's about three hundred and twenty five thousand to have the same level
of affordability, right, So there's that adjustment period. So the data that you're seeing reported only tells part of the story. The other part of the story is actually home ownership's alive and well, plenty of demand, but there's definitely an adjustment period.
Can you explain that to me because I feel like the home owning story is getting very confusing, Like every day there's a new data point that tells.
Me a different story there is and that's so that's part of what we feel the industry, the organization of the financial services industry, really needs to lean in to educating consumers on what's fact and what's ultimately just volatility in the market. Right. And so if you think about if you look at the last ten years as an example, okay, homeowners achieved forty times higher increase in net worth than
renter's debt. Right, So you don't necessarily see that in a lot of the headlines, but for the long term, home ownership as a foundational component of financial health and fitness is really critical. And so that is how we you know, we see organizations addressing that and educating consumers accordingly.
So I don't understand.
So institutions are saying, if you want to increase your net wealth, here's how you do it.
You buy a house.
I think, yeah, So the organization's institutions that we work with, for example, they're really leaning into educating consumers, okay, really leaning into educating them on debt also what their financial goals are and how to build towards those financial goals. So homeownership is a part of the story. It's an important part of the story, but another part of the story. We have a lot of our companies that we work with and partner with do other types of consumer lending.
So as an example, you're also seeing credit card debt increase dramatically in the last quarter of the year by almost at a trillion dollars I think was the statistic that I saw. So the organizations that work with these consumers really have to take their really an intentional approach to educating those consumers on how to manage their debt levels. And then things like home equity, which is a fundamental
backstop for a lot of Americans. They have that equity to fall back on and how they can utilize that to maybe offset high, super high interest rate consumer debt.
Just got about thirty seconds. So net net take away from what you were hearing because you're B to B right, business to business, Yes, so what you are hearing from your clients that you work with, you know, financial institutions, big ones, I'm sure smaller ones too. What's the net takeaway about the market environment? The economic outlog.
What would you say The net takeaway is that long term, the housing market is going to be an incredibly robust market, and home ownership is still an important part of the American dream. Short term, have to get really educated and smart about how that impacts each individual person's unique financial situation.
All right, we're gonna leave it on that note. Joll, thank you so much.
Well, I've got to say that f Scott Fitzgerald once observed that there are no second acts in American lives, and our next guest, I'm certain we'll tell you otherwise. We are so delighted to have with us Chery and Tracy Scifax. They are entrepreneurs, their restaurant tours, their authors. They also happen to be husband and wife. Shary's new book is Second Act, Living Boldly and Abundantly at every age. Tracy two has written a memoir from the Block to
the Boardroom. And they join us here in our Bloomberg Interactive Broker studio, and we're already feeling their energy on a Thursday that's been a little busy and I'm feeling a little tired from being out late.
Let's die. Welcome, Welcome, Welcome.
We want to hear your stories, because I do think you know, we are living in a world where people do have second acts. Our third acts are fourth acts. We're living longer, We're able to do if people move around. Sherry, I want to start with you. You've got a new book out. What was your second act or what is your second act?
It is all encompassing career, love, new place. I moved by moved from Oakland to Philadelphia, knowing no one at the age of forty five.
That's a big move.
People would say, why are you doing that in this stage of your life. Left one career in Silicon Valley area, coming into medical devices in Philadelphia, then met my husband, and now we're restaurant tours. Like you said, we just bought a restaurant in Philadelphia. So really, just in every aspect of my life, I am living a second act because I would have never thought that when I was in Oakland. Yeah, I'd be here with you on Bloomberg Radio.
And here you and here you.
Here I am with Tracy and my husband and with your husband.
So tell us about you've been. I'm just gonna go for it.
You've been incarcerated, you've been a CEO, you've been selected as a championship changed by the Obama White House.
Quite a second act or third act or fourth act. Tell us your story.
Well, as you said, I am forming incarcerated, actually thirty years to the day. I was just posted on social media that I spent thirty years ago a solitary confirement in nineteen ninety two, just to be here now in Bloomberg Studio telling my story. It's an awesome story. I started out a drug addicted drug dealer, selling drugs to support my habit like so many other folks, and got caught up in the justices and spent about seven years
in prison. But one of the things I always felt I was I always felt I was an entrepreneur, and I always felt that if I just changed the product, I could really do something good. So I did that. In nineteen ninety five, I started my first business and grew into a multimillion dollar business in seven years, and just ever since then been off and just being a serial entrepreneur, like just like I always thought I could be.
Well, Shuri, I wonder if you can come back in here and we can talk about the entrepreneurship journey.
You've got to know where you go. I want to go to the food, and that I'm going to go to the dating. I know, I feel like you were going to do dating.
I mean, I really do want to know about Okay, yeah, fine, I'll go to the dating. The match dot Com profile. Yes, the way you describe it in your notes is amazing.
You know. I wanted to make sure that I sat tell people who I was so that they could want to live in the fabulous life that I was living. I had been very satisfied in my single season, but I was like, hey, I want a husband, I want a life partner, and so I lived this really great life. I want to invite someone in. So that's how I created my profile. I didn't say anything about I'm looking for this, I'm looking for that. I said this is
who I am. So that invited someone in. And so that was what I helped people understand about what they want to do with their profiles is invite them in, don't exclude them.
Well, it's a business issue. I know that's so bloombergie of me to say.
But it is.
It's really important, and we don't talk enough about women who are in their second act of life finding love and partnership and the financial implications of that, and I know that's something you're passionate about as well.
Absolutely, and at certain ages, right, I mean if people tell women at forty or forty five, if you're not married, you might as well forget it.
And there was an anger at CNN. Can I even go, Okay, we're not going to go there, but go ahead.
Yeah.
I so people feel isolated. I know, Justin Bateman was just talking about women in aging. Sarah Jessica Parker's head issues with people commenting on her looks, and so women are just really really villainized almost for aging. But there's so much more that we know. Financially, we're more stable, we know what we want. Intimately, we're more confident and clear.
So I'm giving women permission to own that, embrace who you are, and so that you too can live your second life fully abundantly and attract everything that you want because now you're real clear on what it is.
I totally agree. I wish we had more time, Tracy. We have a couple of minutes.
But so why do you think it's so important to share kind of what you went through and show people that, yeah, you can come back and you kind of have a second or third or fourth that act.
Oh absolutely, And it's just around like that. It's Second Chance Month. So we have in this conversation, I say all the time. You know, it's seventy million people in America touched by the criminal justice system.
And those are just the.
Ones that have gotten caught. So we've the Bible teachers that we some unfairly incorrectly. Oh absolutely, absolutely, absolutely so, I think second chance. And as we look at you know, my wife and her second act book, you know, we talk about how we are allowed those second and third chances in life and what do we do with them? And I think that is so important. What do we
do with our second, third chances? And I've been blessed to have been given that, and I just you know, we take advantage of it and everything that we do in business and community.
What is your advice for people who are still writing their first and second acts that might be listening.
I'd love to hear from or in their first act and don't like it, I say, learn from your mistakes, understand where you want to go, be honest with yourself about why you're not getting there. A lot of self realization about, Hey, what are some things that I can tweak or do differently, But then also recognizing that any mistakes that you make don't have to define you and they don't have to keep you there. You can still learn, apply different and catapult from them.
Yeah, I think we don't value mistakes enough. Tracy last forty.
I like to say, key turning the pages, Key turning the pages, and you'll get to the end, and the end there's a beautiful thing.
We'll come back beginnings your second act.
Absolutely. I just got a restaurant. Come on down the Bookers in West Philly.
We didn't get to at the stage of our lives. Let us things are going. We'd love to have you come back.
Great energy, certainly in an environment where it's kind of tough and there's not such great energy around.
So it's really fun to have some time with both of you.
Appreciated.
Yeah, the sci Fax we're talking about Chery and Tracy, as we said, entrepreneurs, restaurant tours, authors, Schari's new book Second Act, Living Boldly and Abundantly at Every Age, and Tracy's book From the Block to the Boardroom.
When did you write that?
Oh, twenty twelve, twenty twelve, so a few years out, but pick them both up because has a great summer reading and weekend reading. Joining us here in our interactive Brokers Studio