Her Story
About Dana
I've been in the mortgage industry for over 35 years, and for the last decade, I've focused specifically on private lending. My journey into mortgage was quite accidental - a childhood friend's father was a mortgage broker, and I went to work for him one summer. He taught me so much about mortgage during that time that I decided never to leave the industry. As Chief Revenue Officer at Dunmore, I work primarily in business purpose lending, which means we're working with investors, builders, and developers who are utilizing mortgages to create investment opportunities. Everything we do is non-owner occupied, and it moves very quickly. What I really enjoy about this space is that it's very relationship-driven - the majority of our customers do deals with us over and over, so we build deeper relationships than in traditional mortgage. My typical day varies wildly, from deal structuring conversations with originators to strategy sessions about building out tech platforms and AI initiatives, to customer calls where I learn what they're looking for from their capital source. I'm passionate about financial literacy, which is why I co-authored a book called 'Rethink Everything You Know about Financial Literacy for Teens.' My foundational education in mortgage came from grit, resiliency, and grace - learning from fantastic mentors who challenged me throughout my career.
When someone asks me what I do, I tell them I have done everything from originate a loan on Main Street to sell it on Wall Street - and virtually everything in between!
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Dana
01What do you attribute your success to?
Grit, Grind and Grace.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
The best career advice I ever received came during the Mortgage Bankers Association Future Leaders program at the Lincoln Institute. One of the leaders said, 'Listen until it hurts.' It literally stopped me in my tracks because I'm a Type A personality and I love to have conversations with people, and sometimes you're talking over someone - that's a really bad habit. That advice has been something I really try to deploy in everything I'm doing, whether with my people or my customers. I try to really listen to them until it just is physically hurting my body, like I feel like I just have to interrupt, and then still don't. I think if everyone could hear that advice, it might just change the trajectory of how many of us interact personally and professionally. I literally just gave this same advice to one of our originators recently.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
There is room at the table if you are willing to do the work! In fact, I will move my chair over, so you can scoot in next to me.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
The biggest challenge in my role as CRO is revenue and that path to profitability - always having your eye on not just the customer experience and the transactions that we do, but ultimately the dollars that they bring into the firm and how we can best utilize those dollars to either expand or grow or scale. That's the place I'm in right now with the role as Chief Revenue Officer for Dunmore. We're a smaller to mid-sized lender that wants to grow to lend nationally and that will take a very disciplined approach.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Candid transparency and honesty are absolutely core values that we have to deliver to our customers. Sometimes we have to deliver a no, and I want them to understand the reasons behind the no. Sometimes the no is just not now - it might be a product that we don't currently offer, or for whatever reason the credentials of that particular investor aren't meeting the standards that we need. Speed has to be a part of what we do. But really, deeply and richly, honesty is the absolute core value that we have to have.
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