Cortney Gardiner
I've been in the lending world for over 15 years now. I actually went to school for art and graduated from Indiana University in 2010 with a bachelor's in visual communication and design. I owned a photography business for a while, but it wasn't meeting the needs for our family, so I ventured into finances very shortly after graduating. I started as a teller at a local bank, and then I was more interested in the lending side, so I started in consumer lending, and then moved into mortgages, and I have been in that field ever since. My typical day involves a lot of different tasks. Aside from underwriting mortgage loans, we have denials that we have to complete, and there's only a couple of us that do those on a daily basis, so I'm one of those. I'm also responsible, solely, really, for our HMDA reporting, which is a type of report that we have to send to the government every year, but we have to track each application and certain data points on all of our mortgage applications. I spend a lot of time answering emails, answering calls, and questions about income, credit, and different scenarios that come up when a loan officer is taking an application. We have to answer to them pretty quickly so they can get their application around and sent to us. The biggest challenge is probably just prioritizing the tasks. The loan officers are number one priority since they're member-facing and need an answer pretty quickly, so we have to make sure we're getting to them as soon as possible. I'm also on a couple committees at our credit union. I'm on the scholarship committee to pick the scholarship winner, and I'm on our newsletter committee for our mortgage department where I'm one of the designers and do a lot of the writing.
• Bachelor's in Visual Communication and Design
• Indiana University
• 2010
• Engage Mentoring Program
• Healthier Moms and Babies - Annual Diaper Drive Organizer and Volunteer
• Credit Union Scholarship Committee Member
• Mortgage Department Newsletter Committee - Designer and Writer
What do you attribute your success to?
I attribute my success to my drive and just wanting to make sure I am a role model for my daughter. Having that motivation to set a good example for her keeps me going and pushes me to achieve more in my career and personal life.
What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
The best advice I got was to stay true to yourself while you're providing for your family or whatever the job entails. You're not always gonna have a job that you love, and it can take you a different path than what you thought you were wanting to go down, but just making sure you know who you are through everything is important. You should never diverge from that. Being authentic and staying true to who you are matters, no matter what professional path you're on.
What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Be flexible. I went into lending and mortgages specifically with more of a black and white mindset, and you cannot have that if you want to do anything with mortgages, because everything changes all the time. So just being flexible is key. The market changes daily, so the rates go up, the rates go down, and you have to be able to adapt. If you're looking at opportunities in the field, I'd say the loan officer area is probably the best opportunity because marketing comes with that. You can basically be your own entrepreneur through that as well, so it just gives you different avenues. I've done originating, and it's very fun because you get to talk to people and market and go to events and things like that.
What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
The biggest opportunity right now is probably in our loan officer area. It's kind of hard because the market changes daily, so the rates go up, the rates go down, but there is a need for loan officers, and that's probably the best opportunity because marketing comes with that. You can basically be your own entrepreneur through that as well, so it just gives you different avenues going that direction first, as opposed to being an underwriter or processor in our field. As far as challenges go, it's probably just prioritizing the tasks. The loan officers are number one priority since they're member-facing and need an answer pretty quickly, so we have to make sure we're getting to them as soon as possible. Obviously, underwriting is a priority too because we want to get those loans to the closing table, but just prioritizing everything and being organized is key because we get so many emails, so many meetings, phone calls, and just making sure everything gets our full attention through every day.
Locations
3Rivers Federal Credit Union
Fort Wayne, IN