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Not many college undergraduates set out to be mortgage brokers - but that's exactly what Colleen Polson decided she would be when she started working.
Polson, a senior loan officer with Mortgage Master Inc., is the in-house mortgage officer at the Higgins Group real estate headquarters in Fairfield, Conn as well as their Stamford and Norwalk offices.
A graduate of the University of Connecticut, she became interested in real estate while taking elective classes. "UConn has a strong real estate program," Polson says. "I took several courses and found it all so interesting."
After learning the nuts and bolts of mortgages, Fannie Mae and real estate investing in the classroom, Polson's first job with a mortgage company in Kansas City taught her everything else she needed to know. "I talked to people on the phone, entered data, basic back end stuff," she says of learning the business from the bottom up.
Returning to her native Connecticut, the Stamford resident was hired as an assistant loan officer with a Norwalk-based mortgage company. Seven years ago, Polson achieved her dream of working at a real estate company when she set up her desk at the Higgins Group. "The next step," she says, "is getting my own assistant."
Despite the country's economic woes, Polson says she has been busy for the past two years. "Purchases dropped off," she says, "but then refinances started." She says many homeowners have refinanced several times, taking advantage of dropping interest rates.
With interest rates at the lowest levels she has ever seen, Polson says many potential home buyers are going to her to get preapproved for mortgages. Does this mean that the real estate market is heating up? "If people come to see me for a mortgage, it means they're pretty serious," she says.
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