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15 that only means you can lose money in multiple states. ere are complementary practice areas where we could educate each other that would benefit all and supplement income when foreclosures are suspended. What were your top takeaways from this year's conference? I love this industry. It was my first job out of law school, working at a servicer. I met my wife and best friends there. at hasn't changed at all in 25 years. I met some great people at the Summit, new folks I am looking forward to seeing again soon. Educationally, we stimulated great conversations in our "table talk" sessions. I think every group ran over on time. Patrick Cox, our keynote, was excellent, and it was interesting to hear his managerial philosophy and about a servicer focused on reverse mortgages. e Joule hotel—I knew I liked it before, but it seemed even better this time around. If they only had an espresso machine in the rooms, it would be perfect! It is just good to be back. RYAN BOLDEN, VP of Default Servicing, PennyMac Loan Services, LLC Halfway through 2022, what are your main priorities and the problems you're trying to solve? As a servicer, when it comes to our customers, what we're really looking at is to resolve the delinquency as our active COVID-19 forbearance numbers continue to go down because they reached their max capacity and they're expiring. We're looking to provide those borrowers options that are unprecedented pre-COVID-19. Now, we have some better streamlined modification options that don't require full underwriting. Obviously, interest rates are beginning to rise, and then we had the HAF program. So, it's really about solicitation and marketing and, ultimately, educating those customers on these options that weren't privy to before COVID-19. What are some of the most critical takeaways you have learned during COVID-19? From a company standpoint, now we have some permanent work-from-home. Just from a cultural aspect, ensuring that everyone's on the same page, measuring the production and the performance of our staff, that's definitely been a shift. You have to ensure that the same individuals who are in the office are also getting that same type of focus outside of the office. ere's been some strain with that to some degree, but as we've implemented more technologies that have helped enhance that, we're seeing much more success in our work-from-home and our in-office agents as it pertains to all our departments across servicing. Have you seen any uptick in borrower responsiveness as you've navigated the pandemic? We've actually set up a portal. Now the customers can go online and check in, so it doesn't necessarily have to just be a customer call-in. ose avenues help the customers with that, but yes, I think we've seen much more responsiveness for the customers, especially after January of this year. Now that foreclosures are back open as forbearance expires, you're going to start receiving collection letters, foreclosure notices, that also can gear them up as well. It's still about exhausting every option to some degree. I will say that there's more educational avenues. Luckily enough, in our modification and our HAF space, we've had tenured staff, so we've been able to transition from our prior Hardest Hit Funds over to Homeowner Assistance Funds. We have a proprietary system that alerts everyone in the company that there's an active HAF on files. With that being said, we've been able to notify other departments as well. I do think that there has been an uptick in that to some degree and definitely a focus on that as well. In particular, we're talking about our modification declines. What we're doing is, when we send out that decline letter, as opposed just putting a blurb on the decline letter that says you also may qualify for this, we're sending out its own separate HAF flyer. at seems to be driving more engagement back as well. We just began that in March, so it's hard to drive what the penetration rate is on that, but we've certainly seen an increase in that as well. What have been your main takeaways from the Summit? I didn't know what to expect, since this is my first one, but it's been a lot of camaraderie, a lot of teamwork. It definitely seems like everyone's engaging on the same page as far as trying to help the customer and determining what's the best practice that this servicer or this law firm may be doing. KERI P. EBECK, Partner, Bernstein- Burkley, P.C. Halfway through 2022, what are your main priorities and the problems you're trying to solve? I primarily do bankruptcy. Consumer bankruptcies are not on the rise. Everybody keeps expecting them at some point to be on the rise, but the problem is, we just don't know when that's going to open up. I think it depends on when foreclosures start, because when foreclosures start and properties start getting listed for sheriff 's sale, obviously that pushes people into filing bankruptcy. I keep thinking that maybe it's going to be beginning, Q1, Q2 of 2023, but that really depends on the foreclosure trends. I know the bankruptcy courts, at least where I practice, are not thinking there's going to be this huge wave like they thought initially, so they're prepared. I think it's going to be a slower trend. You're going to see some filings pick up. ere's definitely not going to be a wave. I'm thinking maybe by the end of 2023, we'll be back to pre-COVID-19 bankruptcy numbers, consumer-wise. Has your firm faced the same challenges of staffing and scaling during the past few years as some of the other firms we've talked to? e way that firms survive during this time is having other practice areas, whether you had them already or you added them during COVID-19. I'm very fortunate, as my firm is primarily a commercial bankruptcy firm, and then I do the consumer part of it on the creditor side. We have a strong litigation group and a strong real estate transaction group. ose are still able to produce and carry the consumer group through until it starts picking back up. I've been fortunate that we've just kind of maintained the status quo. Commercial bankruptcies are not at an all-time high, either. We have not had to add staff, we're just monitoring the trends and going from there. It's like what came first, the chicken or the egg: you Exposure Voices of The 2022 Legal League 100

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