Entrepreneur of the Year
Achieving the American Dream in less than four hours
Layne Sapp
CEO and Founder, MILA
Mountlake Terrace - WA US
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Layne Sapp is making it possible for "less than perfect" borrowers to purchase a home in less than four hours. Now those home buyers can apply for a loan in the morning and have it in closing by lunch.
In the past, buying a home was only easy for "prime" borrowers; those borrowers with almost flawless credit and a 20% down-payment. A different set of rules applied for "everyone else" which included "non-prime" borrowers and even many prime borrowers who wanted more flexible financing, like 100% funding or Interest Only payment options.
The nonprime crowd includes those of us who have flaws on our credit because we forgot to make a payment, or moved and missed a bill. Or maybe we have just started a new job and don't have a year or two supply of pay stubs. Maybe we need a lower down-payment. We're human, we're not perfect, and Layne Sapp understood the need to rectify this issue.
Layne believed that owning a home should be an opportunity for everyone. So, at the young age of 23 (only five years after forming his first investment fund), he created the nonprime lending firm MILA expressly for the average American striving to achieve the American Dream.
To achieve his goal Layne knew he had to make the loan process faster, quicker and easier so he could offer more flexible loan programs at great rates. Since the technology he envisioned didn't yet exist, he formed a team to create his industry-first, forward-thinking technology. This technology set standards for other loan management and tracking systems in the nonprime lending industry. His technology successfully eliminated all questions tied to the nonprime loan process and put control back into the hands of mortgage brokers, who help home buyers obtain financing.
Layne has surpassed his vision of a four hour loan, closing MILA's fastest nonprime loan in 2 hours and 37 minutes. Because of his entrepreneurship, Layne’s firm has funded over 1.5 million homebuyers (who may not have been funded otherwise) to achieve their American Dream.
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