The Senior Lending Network says it will no longer accept applications for new reverse mortgage loans. You may be familiar with Senior Lending Network through its commercials that feature actor Robert Wagner. The company, operated by World Alliance Financial Corp., says existing customers won’t be affected. World Alliance Financial is owned by KBC Group of Belgium.

Reverse Mortgages Will Be Serviced
Although Senior Lending Network has laid off about 140 employees and is scaling back operations, the company said isn’t going out of business. Borrowers who already have reverse mortgage loans should continue to have their loans serviced as usual.

“Both the KBC Group and World Alliance management are working diligently to find a buyer or capital partner for the business, but if we are unsuccessful we will begin to slowly wind it down,” said Viviane Huybrecht, a spokesperson for KBC Group. “In the interim, we will be retaining a core group of employees to ensure that World Alliance Financial is able to honor all of its current obligations, and will provide support services to former sales and support staff to help them through this difficult transition.

Hurt by the Economy
KBC Group has been hit hard by the economic downturn. The company says it is working to find a buyer for the reverse mortgage company and hopes to be back in business in 90 to 120 days. World Alliance Financial was ranked as the No. 4 reverse mortgage lender in May. A spokesperson for the company said that at its peak it funded abut 900 reverse mortgages a month, or about $100 million in volume.

Reverse Mortgage Applications
If you have already completed an application for a reverse mortgage through Senior Lending Network, here is what you need to know:
—If you have a pending application, contact customer service at (800) 562-6755 to find out the status.
—Loans that have already closed will be funded.
—If you applied for a loan through a mortgage broker, call customer service to find out the status of the loan.

Mortgage brokers who have already submitted applications for reverse mortgage loans should go to www.slnwholesale.com or call 1-888-775-3631 for information.

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 9th, 2009 at 6:33 pm and is filed under Reverse Mortgage . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.