What if the toughest mortgage market in years is actually giving you an opportunity to take market share?

In this episode, I sit down with Don Goettling, founder of Momentum Builder and a mortgage industry veteran with nearly four decades of experience, to talk about why loan officers who are waiting for the market to get easier may be making a costly mistake.

Don and I discuss what separates mortgage professionals who are still growing from those who have pulled back—and why your mindset, environment, systems, relationships and willingness to adapt matter more than ever.

We get into:

• Why waiting for rates or the market to “save you” isn’t a strategy
• How successful loan officers are using this market to gain share
• Why getting around other producers who are winning can expand what you believe is possible
• The role of AI, personal branding and better business systems
• Why Realtor partnerships are changing
• The difference between collecting information and actually implementing it
• Why what you do in Q4 can determine how you begin 2027

We also talk about Momentum Builder 2026, taking place October 6–8 in Dallas, Texas.

I attended last year, and I’ll be back again this year.

If you’re serious about growing your mortgage business, meeting other people who are winning in this market, and heading into 2027 with momentum instead of starting from scratch in January, check it out.

🎟️ Momentum Builder 2026 | October 6–8 | Dallas, TX

Full details and registration:
https://www.momentumbuilderevent.com/

Use code ZIMPFER to save $100.

Want to start teaching agent classes?

Get my free 5-day email course, The Agent Class Method, and learn how to use educational classes to get in front of real estate agents, create meaningful follow-up conversations, and develop more referral opportunities.

Get it free at:
https://myagentclasses.com/email-course

Want more Realtor referrals without spending your week cold calling agents?

In this episode, longtime client Glenda White joins the Agent Referral Xcelerator cohort to break down how she uses educational agent classes to create appointments, build trust with real estate agents, and turn those relationships into mortgage referral opportunities.

Glenda shares the process she uses after teaching a Google Business Profile class for real estate agents, including how she gets agents to book 15-minute audits, asks for reviews, follows up for six weeks, and creates a natural opportunity to ask for the agent’s next buyer.

You’ll hear:

• Why teaching agent classes gives loan officers a better reason to start conversations with Realtors
• How Glenda turns a class into booked one-on-one appointments
• The 15-minute audit process she uses after class
• How she follows up for six weeks without sounding like a cold caller
• How and when she asks agents for the business
• Why some of her best referral relationships started with agents she might not have targeted otherwise

If you’re a loan officer, mortgage broker, branch manager, or mortgage professional looking for a better way to build Realtor relationships, this episode gives you a practical look at how agent classes can become part of your mortgage marketing strategy.

Want to start teaching agent classes?

Get my free 5-day email course, The Agent Class Method, and learn how to use educational classes to get in front of real estate agents, create meaningful follow-up conversations, and develop more referral opportunities.

Get it free at:
https://myagentclasses.com/email-course

You didn't wake up one day and choose a life you don't recognize. You drifted into it, one compromise at a time.

Shawn Mingus spent 20 years teaching this to more than 4,000 people, and his position is blunt: balance is the right word. Work-life is the broken part. Life doesn't have two dimensions. It has eight.

In this conversation, Shawn walks through the exercise from his book Reimagining Balance: score all eight by emotion instead of a vague 1-to-10, plot them as a polygon, and look at the shape. Not a circle. A circle would mean you're playing it safe. The goal is an honest shape you can act on. Then the part most people skip — turning that shape into one or two daily actions in the two dimensions that need you most, and re-running the whole thing every 90 days.

WHAT YOU'LL GET:

- Why "work-life balance" is a false choice — and what replaces it

- The eight dimensions of a life, defined (profession is not your job)

- How to spot drift before it costs you a marriage, your health, or a decade

- Why the goal is aware imbalance, not artificial symmetry

- Scoring by emotion — the piece almost every balance framework misses

- The "glow effect": why fixing one dimension lifts the other seven

- The communication moves that keep your spouse on your side

- How often to re-run it (and what happens when you don't)

GET THE BOOK + WORKBOOK

Go to Reimagining Balance → https://reimaginingbalance.com

CONNECT WITH SHAWN

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shawn-mingus-67b2a32/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shawnmingus/

Listen to the episode, then DM Shawn your one big takeaway.

FOR LOAN OFFICERS: Get ten years of what top Loan Officers do that works.

Every episode of Mortgage Marketing Radio is broken down into scripts, playbooks, and exact moves so that you can find the answer in 2 minutes.

GO HERE: https://swipethevault.com

Most loan officers are stuck on the bottom two floors of a pyramid they don't know they're standing on.

Floor one is solicitor. Cold calls, coffee invites, "I'd love to learn about your business." Agents have heard it a thousand times and they know what it is.

Floor two is vendor. You broke through, you're getting deals, and you're still leading with product and price. DSCR. Self-employed programs. Close on time. Everybody says that, which means it's worth nothing.

Between vendor and partner sits what I call the referral gap. This episode is about crossing it.

I recently sat down with Rachel on the Lending Leadership podcast and we went deeper than I planned to. We covered the pyramid, the one-to-many method I used to build my own business, why "five mile famous" beats being the best-kept secret in your market, and the three things you actually control when the market gets weird.

We also talked about the year I've had. Cancer, three months where I barely spoke, and what it teaches you when the thing you make your living with gets taken away for a while.

What you'll take from this one:

• The four stages of the Realtor Prospecting Pyramid, and where you're actually standing right now
• The referral gap — why price, products, and turn times can never move you from vendor to partner
• The one-to-many math: one meeting with 20 agents beats 20 meetings with one agent
• The exact soft close I use at the end of a class, word for word, that gets agents booking calendar time without a pitch
• Class topics agents actually want (their problems, not your products)
• How I turned 10 years and 425 episodes into a free searchable archive in about 12 hours

Resources mentioned:

• Swipe The Vault — 10 years of Mortgage Marketing Radio, searchable by topic, with swipe files and playbooks attached. Free: https://www.swipethevault.com
• Get More Agents — how I work with loan officers on agent classes: https://www.getmoreagents.com
• The Lending Leadership podcast with Rachel — go subscribe, she's doing good work:
  https://www.hmamortgage.com/page/lending-leadership-podcast

If this one helps, the best thing you can do is leave a rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. 261 people have, and we're sitting at 4.9. It's how new loan officers find the show.

Six months chasing one agent. She finally texts back, and the Loan Officer freezes. No idea what to say.

Five years ago I'd have typed him a long answer from memory of how to reply.

Last week I just said: that's episode 317.

Here's what changed.

425 episodes of Mortgage Marketing Radio. Ten years of practitioners who actually do the work, scripting, database, agent classes, consumer direct. The answer to almost any problem you've got is already in there.

And functionally, all of it was unusable. A podcast feed is chronological. Your problem isn't. It shows up on a Tuesday when you've got 30 seconds to say the right thing.

So I had every episode distilled to its takeaways. Summary, quotes, links, play button. All of it behind one search box.

AI did in a weekend what would've taken me six months.

It's called The Vault. Free. No upsell. My thank-you for ten years.

In this episode, I also get straight with you about why it's happening now, because this show is changing.

Press play. Then go unlock the vault here: swipethevault.com

I'm back behind the mic with a rapid-fire episode — two swipeable ideas you can put to work this week, plus the one thing that decides whether anyone shows up to your next class.

Idea #1 — Turn MLS data into content realtors ask for.
Jerad Larkin pulled 12,029 Denver home sales and found roughly 63% closed with a seller concession, around $10,000 on average. He broke it down by property type and price range, white-labeled it into a carousel, and handed it to agents to post as their own. One Facebook post pulled 21 comments asking for the copy. I show you how to get the same data for your market from your title rep or an agent — and how to use it to start real conversations instead of chasing coffee meetings.

Idea #2 — The email that turns a closing into a class.
My buddy Anthony in Florida sends one email after every closing that edifies the agent, CCs their broker, and opens a direct line to the broker's office. I break down who to CC, what to say, and how it leads to hosting a class for the brokerage — with a recruiting angle brokers say yes to.

Bonus — The #1 secret to filling your class.
It isn't the food. It isn't the CE credits. It's the title. I run the quick test I've given hundreds of times and show you how to name a class agents actually sign up for.

Timestamps
00:00 – Back at the mic: Cabo, remission, and a health update
04:45 – Idea #1: Turn MLS data into a content play realtors ask for
06:30 – The Denver numbers: ~63% concessions, ~$10K, 12,029 home sales
12:00 – Be the partner, not the vendor: the offer that starts conversations
13:00 – Idea #2: The one email after a closing that books you a class
18:00 – The recruiting angle brokers say yes to
21:00 – The #1 secret to filling your next class (it's the title)
24:00 – A changeup is coming to the show

Resources & links mentioned

• Jerad Larkin's seller-concession carousel: https://tinyurl.com/bdt48jvz
• Jerad Larkin on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@milehightitleguy
• Get on the early-bird list for the August accelerator — DM me on Instagram or LinkedIn

Connect with Geoff
Instagram & LinkedIn: @GeoffZimpfer

Gen Z homebuyers are watching your videos, checking their credit, and still not picking up the phone. Here's exactly why, and the fix that gets them to call.

Guild Mortgage partnered with YouGov on a national Gen Z Homebuyer Study: 1,400+ buyers, open-ended answers, their real words. In this episode, guest host Katie Shive sits down with Drew Gillette, VP of Marketing at Guild, to break down why young buyers go quiet and the content that finally earns the call.

The number that explains it all: Gen Z rates their confidence to ever buy a home a 3.16 out of 10. They're not gone. They're embarrassed because they don't know enough, so they lurk instead of reaching out. Close that confidence gap, and you close the lead.

What you'll learn:

• Why 1 in 2 Gen Z buyers want to meet in person (the "TikTok mortgage" myth, busted)
• The income illusion: why higher earners feel LESS confident they can buy
• The one word buyers kept using, and why it keeps them off your calendar
• The realtor vs. loan officer trust gap, and the simple fix
• Why 75% trust friends and family over any loan officer (and how to use it)
• How to actually use YouTube, Reddit, and Facebook groups to get found
• The "reverse play" that leads to your referral partners

📊 Download the GenZ Survey:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OlDHDsn1PsEfxKuusN6IVRCf120lki31/view?usp=sharing

🔗 Connect with Drew Gillett:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/drewgillett/

🔗 Connect with Katie Shive:

https://www.instagram.com/heykatieshive/

You’ve been sold a lie: that if you just post enough content, the business will come.

It won’t. And in this guest-host takeover of Mortgage Marketing Radio, Michelle Mikel and Jennifer Butcher prove it with real numbers.

Jen is a 25-year mortgage veteran and host of the She Talks Money podcast. She was doing what all the gurus tell you to do — five videos a week, a polished feed, all of it. And she was still stuck on the question that haunts every originator: “When am I actually going to make money from this?”

So guest host Michelle Mikel put her through a 30-day challenge built on one rule that sounds too simple to work: one message a day, to one person you don’t know.

Inside this episode, you’ll hear:

• Why the $5,000/month social media manager is rarely
the answer (and what Jen pays instead)

• The difference between content that gets 20,000 views and content that gets paid

• The exact 4-part message framework that took Jen’s “yes” rate from ~30% to nearly 50%

• The “ick” prospecting lines you’re probably still using, and what to say instead

• How 30 messages turned into 5 podcasts, 6 agent meetings, and a calendar booked into July

If you’re tired of pouring time and money into content that doesn’t pay you back, this is the episode.

Hit play. Then send one message today.

———

Connect with Jennifer Butcher on Instagram: @JenniferButcherOfficial

Listen to Jennifer’s podcast:

Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/she-talks-money/id1805894710

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2tVr8kAQv8L3xbhdOoWpvg?si=c915dc1f09e94139

Connect with Michelle Mikel on Instagram: @BermanMediaSocial

I studied two new research reports covering 260,000+ LinkedIn posts — and in this quick-hit episode, I break down exactly what's working on LinkedIn in 2026, specifically for loan officers and mortgage pros who want to get seen, build a personal brand, and attract referral partners.

Just the data, and what to actually do with it.

You'll learn:

✅ Whether links really hurt your reach (the answer surprised me)

✅ The format with an 11X interaction boost most LOs never use

✅ Why horizontal video beats vertical by 36% on LinkedIn

✅ The post length that performs 31% better in 2026

✅ The hashtag habit that drops performance 70%

✅ The 741% rule the top 1% of creators live by

✅ The lead magnet quietly crushing it right now (it's not a PDF)

🔗 RESOURCES & LINKS

• Build your personal brand voice with Katie Shive → https://www.KatieShive.com
  
• Want in on the next agent class cohort? It opens in September and fills fast. CLICK HERE to RSVP: https://tinyurl.com/arxcohort
  
  

You feel it, don't you? That constant pressure to post more, create more, be more online — just to keep up. Meanwhile, your pipeline isn't moving the way it should.

Here's what nobody's telling you: the top-producing loan officers I work with aren't stressing about their next post going viral. They're doing something different. Something that's been working since before social media existed. And it's making a massive comeback.

In this episode, I'm going off-script to challenge the "post more" narrative that the gurus keep pushing. I'll share why IRL — in real life — local influence is outperforming the algorithm for the loan officers I coach. And I'll give you real stories from real LOs who've added $20M, $30M, even doubled their production — not by becoming influencers, but by becoming the go-to lender in their local market.

You'll hear:

→ Why the "content creator" pressure is burning you out (and what to do instead)

→ The strategy that's landing LOs in front of 20-30 agents at a time

→ How one LO turned a single workshop into a spot on a national sales training call with 400+ agents

→ Why direct mail is working (yes, even with millennials)

→ Jeff Bezos's question that should change how you think about your business

→ Details on the Agent Referral Accelerator cohort launching May 21st

If you're tired of feeding the algorithm and ready to build real relationships that generate real referrals — this one's for you.

🔗 Learn more: https:www.getmoreagents.com

📩 DM me on Instagram or LinkedIn with questions

Six weeks ago, I went silent. No episodes. No posts. No noise.

I was fighting cancer.

Squamous cell carcinoma of the tonsil and tongue. Two rounds of chemo. Thirty rounds of radiation. And a whole lot of time to think.

Today, I'm back. And I'm not just picking up where I left off — I'm coming back with new clarity, new energy, and some powerful insights I can't wait to share with you.

In this episode:

• What the last 6 weeks looked like (the real version, not the polished one)
• A huge thank-you to the guest hosts who kept this show alive while I was down
• What I've been studying about AI, marketing, and visibility is about to change the game for mortgage professionals
• HubSpot's new AEO tool and why "Answer Engine Optimization" should be on every LO's radar right now
• A tease of a pivotal change coming soon to Mortgage Marketing Radio and MMI

This is a personal one. It's also one of the most important episodes I've ever recorded. If you've ever been knocked down and had to figure out how to get back up — this one's for you.

Episode Resources:

Hubspot AEO Tool: https://www.hubspot.com/products/aeo

Connect with Geoff:

• Instagram: @GeoffZimpfer
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/geoffzimpfer
• YouTube: Subscribe to Mortgage Marketing Radio