Turnover in the mortgage business can be high and, when times are good, poaching is commonplace. That’s why Cornerstone Mortgage has come up with a different idea of how new loan originators should be recruited and trained.

Grow Our Own is a program geared toward the next generation of finance professional, enrolling college students and recent graduates in both intern and junior loan originator programs to teach them the mortgage business, according to Jim Hunter, program visionary and a loan officer at one of Cornerstone’s two Fort Collins offices.

The program uses connections with area universities like CSU and UNC to find students interested in pursuing a career in finance, and then enrolls them in the program, where they learn the elements of mortgage banking.

Those enrolled in the junior loan originator training then go through 20 hours of training before taking the federal and state licensing exams. In all, the program is six months long.

The most recent local class to complete the training consisted of eight recent graduates from CSU, UNC and the University of Colorado. Some of the former trainees are already helping to originate loans at Cornerstone.

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