Chantilly, Virginia-based mortgage bank Prosperity Home Mortgagea subsidiary of HomeAmerica Servicespromoted Justin Messer to president and chief executive officer on January 1, 2023. Messer succeeds Tim Wilson, who has served in the role since 2014.
Messer, who was Prosperity’s chief operating officer for more than three years, will be responsible for leading the lender to its “next stage of growth and performance,” he said in a statement Wednesday.
The new chief executive is no stranger to the role, as evidenced by his “strategic insight and vision,” Wilson said, noting that Messer worked closely with him for nearly 10 years.
Messer has been with Prosperity since January 2011, serving as the senior vice president of capital markets and corporate strategy before being promoted to chief operating officer in 2019. Prior to Prosperity, the executive was a trader at Quicken Loans (now known as rocket mortgage) for five years and brings with him nearly 20 years of experience in the industry.
Wilson will retire at the end of 2022 but will continue as chairman of the board, the company said.
“Tim’s leadership helped guide Prosperity to become a national mortgage bank, expanding its licensed footprint to 49 jurisdictions and creating a wide range of lending products,” said Gino Blefari, CEO of HomeServices of America.
Originally formed as a joint venture between Long and breeding companies Y Wells Fargo CompaniesProsperity became a wholly owned subsidiary of Long & Foster in 2014. The Long & Foster Companies is a subsidiary of HomeServices of America, an affiliate of Berkshire Hathaway.
Prosperity’s sales volume fell to $10.2 billion in the last 12 months from production of $15.4 billion in 2021, according to modex. In turn, the lender cut operating costs by issuing pink vouchers to employees in October 2022.
the size of october Lay off is unknown, but a spokesman said the bank was “forced to make the difficult decision to reduce its number of employees” given today’s higher rate environment.
The Virginia-based mortgage bank sponsors 679 loan originators and has 492 branches, according to the NMLS. Internal Mortgage Finance counts Prosperity as the 41st largest lender in the country with a total market share of 0.5% in the home lending space.
Prosperity generated a volume of $10 billion in the first three quarters of last year, 14.5% less than in the same period of 2021, according to the IMF. Some 81.7% of all its sales volume came from purchase mortgages and refis accounted for 16.9%, according to Modex data.
