Cornerstone Mortgage

Cornerstone Mortgage, Inc(CMI) does not feel our communication to the credit bureaus was misleading or contained any material misrepresentations The information in the letter we provided to the bureaus appears valid based upon our records and discussions with the employees involved Neither the letter to the bureaus nor our previous response to this complaint made any claim that we had communicated directly with the consumer in order to obtain a second authorization prior to the credit inquiry on 8/13/ The letter stated we had advised the consumer on actions they could take to improve their credit profile after the original credit inquiry in June, and we were mistakenly under the impression that they had made improvements and wished for an updated inquiry to be made to determine the effects of those improvements.CMI does not typically provide public details of disciplinary action against employees, however, we do feel our actions in this situation were appropriate Federal regulations relating to credit inquiries do not actually require a company or loan officer to obtain consumer authorization prior to performing a credit inquiry These regulations only require a company to have a permissible purpose for a credit inquiry, and it could be interpreted that CMI had a permissible purpose for the 8/13/credit inquiry based on the discussions that originally occurred in June The employees involved were under the assumption that the 8/13/credit inquiry was acceptable due to the authorization given and permissible purpose established in the previous conversation with the consumer While it is likely that this assumption was technically accurate, we have taken this opportunity to educate these employees further on the customer service implications of such inquiries We have also informed them that an additional authorization should be obtained for subsequent credit inquiries in order to conform to the underlying spirit of our internal policies, which do require employees to go above and beyond regulatory requirements by obtaining an authorization for credit inquiries These employees also worked diligently to assist the consumer with adjusting the credit inquiry to a soft pull once the issue was brought to their attention Because of these reasons, we do not feel additional disciplinary action is warranted.Regarding the comment stating “there are several reviews of this company doing the identical thing to other consumers”, we do not feel this statement is accurate While it is true that CMI has received a relatively small number of past complaints related to disputes of credit inquiries, we have almost universally demonstrated that such inquiries were performed in compliance with credit reporting regulations and that the related complaints were either frivolous in nature or the result of the consumer having an incomplete understanding of credit reporting regulations and how credit inquiries affect their credit profile CMI regularly performs five hundred to a thousand credit inquiries a month, and it is not unexpected for any company with this volume of credit inquires to regularly have some of those inquiries disputed for various reasons even if they were performed in a compliant mannerIt is also inaccurate that CMI in any way uses credit inquiries to attempt “to lock people in before they have a choice of mortgage companies” If CMI, or any company, attempted to do this it would result in an overwhelming amount of consumer disputes and complaints, and such actions would quickly be addressed by their credit provider Doing this would also not produce the proposed result because credit inquiries have almost no effect in locking a consumer into a company This is because of the way mortgage inquiries work Specifically, if multiple mortgage companies pull a consumer’s credit in any day time period, those inquires only count against the consumer’s score as a single inquiry, and mortgage inquiries do not affect a consumer’s score until days after the inquiry, so there is ample time for a consumer to have another company pull their credit without the inquiry from the first company affecting their score Due to these reasons, there is no benefit for a mortgage company being the first one to pull a consumer’s credit.We feel the credit bureaus decision to update the hard credit inquiry to a soft credit inquiry was the proper and appropriate action for this situation and that this change fully meets the consumer’s desire for the inquiry to have no adverse effect on their credit profile when they attempt to obtain future financing Companies are able to make soft inquires on consumers for many reasons, and they are not required to obtain any type of permission or inform the consumer before making these types of inquiries This is because, as previously communicated, soft inquires do not have a negative effect on a consumer’s credit profile Because of this allowance, CMI could have chosen to request an update to the 6/1/inquiry on 8/13/instead of requesting a new hard inquiry If this action had been taken, it would have been a soft inquiry on the consumer, and this would have been the same end result as the bureaus’ decision to change the 8/13/hard inquiry to a soft inquiry The reason we did not originally process it as a soft inquiry was because, while that would have shown us the improvements that had been made the individual accounts, it would not have provided information on what effect those changes had on the consumer’s credit score.I hope this addresses all of the concerns communicated in the original complaint and the response If you need any further information, please contact me at the info below [redacted] Director of Compliance Cornerstone Mortgage, Inc[redacted] @cornerstonemortgage.com [redacted] ***, Chesterfield, MO

Revdex.com: I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted] , and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me Sincerely, [redacted]

Complaint: [redacted] I am rejecting this response because: The reason for the rejection is because there was no communication between myself and cmiOn 8-13-or for that matter any time after the original inquiryUntil the inquiry was discovered by myself Also there was misleading information and direct lies provided to the credit agencies that I feel may have determined how they removed the inquiryI don’t believe that speaking to the employees that caused this issue is sufficient enoughThere are several reviews of this company doing the identical thing to other consumersI feel like this whole situation is a way for this company to lock people in before they have a choice of mortgage company’sA realtor should not be able to contact a company and have a hard inquiry placed with out any such communication toward the realtor or cmiI do however feel like this is going to be the extent of this situation unless someone takes legal action against cmi, due to there experiences and doing this to previous consumersThank you to the Revdex.com for protecting the consumer and demanding a response Sincerely, [redacted]

Initial Business Response / [redacted] (1000, 7, 2015/10/27) */ Dear Ms [redacted] Cornerstone Mortgage, Inchas reviewed the complaint filed by Ms [redacted] regarding our inquiry of her credit history on September 8, At the time, [redacted] was working with a realtor to list her home for saleThe realtor selected to be the listing agent was [redacted] is a licensed Loan Officer and Branch Manager for Cornerstone Mortgage, Inc [redacted] contacted [redacted] about speaking with [redacted] , regarding a potential loan preapprovalMr [redacted] then spoke with [redacted] , and they discussed potential options for loan preapprovalDuring this conversation [redacted] provided [redacted] with the personal information necessary to run a credit inquiry, including Birth Date, Address, and Social Security card number, as well as verbal authorization to submit a credit inquiry [redacted] followed up by submitting a credit inquiry, which is now reflecting on [redacted] 's credit report Since Ms [redacted] provided a verbal authorization, along with individual identifying information, we cannot request removal of this credit inquiry from her credit history reportWe regret that Ms [redacted] was not completely satisfied with her experiece with Cornerstone Mortgage, IncWe take all consumer complaints very seriouslyIn addition, we strive to provide the best possible service to our clients, as exemplified by our 97% customer approval rating