Cornerstone Mortgage Co. on Tuesday said it will comply with a consent order issued by the Georgia Department of Banking and Finance and pay $90,000 in penalties to resolve claims that the Houston-based nonbank lender allowed unlicensed loan officers to originate loans.
Without admitting fault or liability, Cornerstone, its chairman and CEO, Marcus Laird, and company president and COO, Judith Belanger all agreed to overhaul its practices and policies to adhere to Georgia banking laws, including heightened oversight of branch managers, loan originators and other employees of the company, which does business in Georgia as Brayden Capital Home Loans.
Cornerstone will pay $88,000 to the GDB and an additional $2,000 to the State Regulatory Registry, a subsidiary of the Conference of State Bank Supervisors that supports the National Mortgage Licensing System. Cornerstone did not return a telephone call seeking comment.
In April, the GDB issued cease and desist orders to two Cornerstone employees, Sheldon Mark Henry Baker and Charles Lee “Bo” Carter, after an examination of the lender’s operations found the two were originating mortgages without the proper licenses. In Carter’s case, the department said it denied an application for a Georgia mortgage originator’s license in July 2010.
The consent order rescinded proposed cease and desist orders against Laird and Belanger and a notice of intent to revoke Cornerstone’s mortgage lender license. Baker and Carter are banned from working at a state-licensed mortgage brokerage or lender in Georgia for five years.
The consent order comes on the heels of Cornerstone’s settlement with the Department of Housing and Urban Development over allegations that it
The settlement requires Cornerstone to pay $15,000 to one woman, plus set up a $750,000 victims' fund to compensate other borrowers from the company who might have been discriminated against.
Cornerstone was the sole lender originating loans on MortgageMatch.com until its relationship with website developer Move Inc. dissolved earlier this month. After launching at the end of 2010, MortgageMatch.com traffic soared, due in part to the cross-promotion and support it received from the National Association of Realtors’ website Realtor.com, which is also managed by Move Inc.
Neither Cornerstone nor Move will discuss why the agreement was terminated less than a year after the site launched, and MortgageMatch.com, still controlled by Move Inc., no longer offers online lending.
