Texas Roots to Industry Innovation: Melanie Power’s Mission at Polly

HousingWire

Melanie Powers explores her journey from her Greek family upbringing in Texas to becoming a key player in the mortgage industry. Discover how mentorship, customer engagement, and a passion for innovation shaped her career at Polly. Melanie reflects on her challenges, successes, and the transformative role of technology in redefining capital markets.

Transcript

00:00I really find that our customers are not just a customer, you know, they are our partner.

00:07We want to work together to a better, more automated mortgage world.

00:20I was born in Austin, Texas, and grew up in Dallas, Texas, went to college in Texas,

00:27and have had all of my mortgage career in Texas. I have a massively huge family. I'm Greek,

00:35and my entire family lives in the same neighborhood, so we are all very, very close.

00:41I definitely am open to new learning experiences. I'm definitely open to learning from others.

00:48I feel like that really shaped me well for my entire career. Every place that I've worked,

00:55they would say, oh, who does that? And everybody would always say, well, just ask Melanie,

01:00and she'll do it. I was always looking for guidance and input in order to make my own

01:08decision. I do try to hear all of the different viewpoints of that, so I think that's really

01:14important in my role now. Having mortgage experience, but working in product and technology,

01:21it's very important that I don't rely on just my knowledge and that I am taking that feedback

01:28and constantly incorporating that. I had a very strange start, but I feel like that's kind of

01:40tradition in the mortgage industry. I was very interested in real estate. I wanted to become

01:45a realtor until I met some mortgage people who just thought that I fit their culture and their

01:54needs at that time, and I ended up going over and working in the mortgage industry.

02:00As far as getting into secondary and lock desk, capital markets, that world, that was a little bit

02:06of a funny story. I basically was the AVP of shipping and post-closing. The leadership came

02:13to me and told me that I should join the secondary department, and I didn't want to.

02:20I actually kind of said no at first until they really said, basically, your job is being

02:28eliminated and you really need to move. I said, oh, I'm going to secondary, and I loved it.

02:34I absolutely loved it. I love economics. That's definitely a huge passion of mine.

02:44My team is called the Innovation Capital Markets Lock Desk Team. We really focus in on the lock

02:52desk and the capital markets user, definitely enhancing their experience, making that better

02:59so that they can have better customer service for the loan officers. It's very important to have

03:06a lock desk capital markets team that is loan officer-centric. That's our big focus.

03:12I meet with customers on a regular basis, taking the customer feedback, getting it into design,

03:19taking it back to the customer to make sure that I am aligned with them and going in the direction

03:25that they like, and finalizing those requirements and then communicating that to the engineer team,

03:32making sure that the end result is the customer is happy.

03:35I've just never been so engaged and so happy. I love to teach and I love to learn. Probably those

03:45two things are the most rewarding to me. I love learning the different ways that capital markets

03:52or lock desk customers do things or think the way they think about things. I love the people

04:00of this company. They are really special and really care a lot. Like every day, we just,

04:07you know, put on a smile. It's all about the people and our customers.

04:16I came to Poly with a mission. There is something that we have been lacking in the mortgage industry.

04:24It's the renegotiation tool. If you ask anyone that has sat on a lock desk, their biggest pain

04:30point, the hardest task that they ever had to do, they easily and quickly will answer you that it's

04:38renegotiating rates. Poly is going to be the first pricing engine to launch renegotiation for the

04:48lock desks to perform these tasks very easily based off of their policy to know if the rate can

04:54be renegotiated in order to allow the loan officers to quickly get back to the borrowers.

05:00Couldn't be anything better in the entire world than this. It's just a game changer and we're

05:07very excited about it. What am I most excited about? Well, I'm excited about the fact that

05:17what am I most excited about Poly's future is there are so many amazing ideas that are

05:23floating around this company. The renegotiation is by far my baby. I am in love with it. It has

05:31been, it was born in my brain before I came to Poly, but it has morphed because I have been

05:40talking with customers and getting their feedback on it and talking about, ooh, it would be cool if

05:46it did this. All of our customers are so invested in it and so excited about it. That specifically

05:53is what I'm excited about. As for the future of Poly altogether, I am so excited to bring

06:01something like Poly to the mortgage industry, not just in regards of giving them a good tech,

06:09but also in giving them a partnership in someone that really cares and wants to hear about them.

06:16I really love to be a part of that with Poly,

06:19and I really see our customers just opening up and loving it as well.

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