Spring House Hunt
A Q&A with Boston-based Shant Banosian, one of the country’s country’s most successful mortgage lenders.
By any standard, Shant Banosian’s success in the mortgage business over the last 18 years has been remarkable. He’s not just the top loan originator in Greater Boston. He’s finished in the trade magazine Scotsman Guide’s top five best loan originators in the country for the last 10 years, most often in the number 1 spot.
In 2024, he made 1,594 loans totaling more than $1 billion. Home purchases made up 94 percent, and 6 percent was refinancing.
On March 5, Rate (formerly Guaranteed Rate) chief executive Victor Ciardelli announced Banosian had been named president of Rate Mortgage, a Chicago-based lender with more than 300 branch offices nationwide.
We spoke to Banosian about his plans in his new role and the future of mortgage lending.
Q. Will you continue to do loan origination while serving as president of Rate?
A. Yes, I’ll do both. I’m the first president in the history of the company. Our CEO, Victor Ciardelli, has done an amazing job building an innovative company. He’s always pushed us to get better, and he’s going to remain in that role as a visionary and leader of the company. My job is to work closely on the mortgage side of the business, to continue to move that forward, and work with the people in our different offices.
The mortgage business is changing every single day. One thing I’ve proven over the course of my career is that I can change with it and stay ahead of the competition, stay relevant. I want to help our loan originators do the same thing. But in order for me to do that, not only do I have to work with our sales force, but I have to work with all the other departments that support our sales force for marketing and branding and operations.
Q. About a week after Rate announced you were being promoted to president, Rocket Mortgage announced it was buying the Redfin real estate company. How do you think that will impact the industry?
A. I didn’t see that coming, but I understand why they’re interested in doing it. It could be a really smart solution. Rocket has always been consumer-direct. And Redfin’s portal is the best in real estate to get consumers’ eyeballs. Everybody uses Redfin’s portal to search for properties — even real estate agents at other companies. Now they can get to the consumer immediately as they begin to look for homes.
It’s the start of what could be a vertically integrated home solution. They’ll get the consumer as soon as they start looking for homes and offer them financing. They also offer title services and home insurance services. If they’re able to pull it off, it could be really great, and ultimately, might lead to more competitive offerings across all the different services for the homeowner.
Companies like Zillow have also been trying to figure out the same thing. We have always historically been a company that works directly with our clients. We do a really great job maintaining a really long life cycle with our clients once we do business with them.
Q. Do you have any new initiatives planned for Rate?
A. Going forward, we want people to think of us regarding anything with an interest rate. That’s our goal. Right now, we offer mortgages, personal loans, home equity lines, home equity loans, and home insurance. Eventually, we hope to be able to offer things like credit cards, car loans, and student loans. It opens us up to be able to be a one-stop shop for borrowing consumers.
Q. What challenges do you foresee in maintaining your current business and acting as president of Rate?
A. Managing my time, first, but also, we’re a large organization spread all across the country, and I’m one of those people who wants to make an immediate impact. I’ve just got to be patient. I’m trying to get out in front of everybody as much as possible, in person, obviously utilizing technology as well.
But I have to stay patient in terms of making all the different connections I want to make with people. And then, the market is always going to throw things at you that you can’t prepare for. Generally, the thing that is the biggest issue of the year is something nobody forecasted, like COVID or in 2022 when interest rates more than doubled from around 3 percent to over 7 percent in 10 months.
Q. Where do you see mortgage interest rates going for the rest of this year?
A. I believe that interest rates will come down toward the end of this year, as the Fed likely cuts two to three more times. Right now, Wall Street is predicting pricing in three rate cuts for later this year, which could also be a good time for some people to refinance. However, if these tariffs stay in effect and aren’t able to be negotiated, it could lead to inflation. If inflation spikes up, then rates will go up, and that would be bad for buyers and people looking to refinance.
Q. What does it take to qualify for a mortgage in this market?
A. Get financially prepared. A lender is always going to want to review your credit, income, and assets. Those are the three qualifying factors at every bank and mortgage institution. They should be able to help you understand what the best rates and products are, what you need for credit requirements.
There’s a lot of misconceptions around down payments. People think they need 20 percent down. There’s a lot of great first-time homebuyer programs with 3 percent down and down payment assistance programs and things of that nature.
Q. Your office is decorated with lots of Boston sports memorabilia and you make a lot of sports analogies. Is that how you approach your work?
A. Yes. Teamwork, competition, practice, all those things are things that I grew up valuing. It’s really helped me get the right mindset to figure out all the work that goes into having a successful business. It’s the stuff that goes on behind the scenes that nobody sees.
You have to learn how to win, learn how to come back from losses, having a strategy, but also then knowing that things aren’t going to go according to plan and being prepared to react accordingly. I also look at every new year as a new opportunity.
Over my career, we’ve had amazing markets and super challenging markets, but there’s been opportunity in all of them, whether it’s to gain market share or to better serve our clients or better serve our partners, and doing work that allows us to stand out.
I tell people as a child, I wanted to be a professional athlete. I feel like I became a professional athlete, except my sport of choice is now mortgage and housing. There’s nothing more fulfilling than listening to someone, having them list what their obstacles and challenges are, and then helping come up with a solution, having them implement changes, and then getting feedback from them that it’s making a difference.
Jim Morrison can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on X @jimmorrison617.
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