| If you ask most teenagers what their future career paths might look like, chances are most of them will have no clear-cut idea. But for Maryruth Ryan, vice president of Bank of America Home Loans, that question, even at that time of her life, would have received a resounding answer – the real estate/mortgage business.
A 1980 graduate of Worcester State College, now known as Worcester State University, Ryan received a Bachelor of Science degree in economics. While she worked toward her degree, she also took courses that led to real estate licensure.
“I always knew I’d go into the mortgage/real estate business,” said Ryan, a 30-year veteran of the mortgage industry. “Even in high school, I knew this. It’s rather unusual for someone in my age bracket.”
Early in her career, Ryan worked at a number of small mortgage companies that no longer exist.
“I also had a small broker company in the late ’80s/early ’90s,” she said. “And I’ve also been a major real estate investor. Knowing the mortgage industry has helped me in this area. I can make savvy decisions.”
For the last 13 years, Ryan has been employed at Bank of America, where she manages 22 mortgage loan officers in the Metro Boston area.
Working in the mortgage industry has left Ryan with little free time, and that’s okay with her.
“Work consumes me,” she said, adding that that everyone in this industry echoes the same sentiment. “It’s a 24-7 job.”
Educating Clients
Ryan takes a cool-headed approach to her career in today’s uncertain economic climate. Even though the mortgage industry has come under a microscope in recent years, she continues to react with aplomb.
“While today’s underwriting environment is arguably more stringent that it was five to seven years ago, guidelines are not all that dissimilar from their historic norms,” she said.
“The key today is setting expectations and educating our client base,” she remarked. “Even if it’s not the easy process some of these borrowers remember from six years ago, they feel a lot better when we take the time to explain how and why things are different. Not only does this facilitate greater transactional ease, it also reminds the customer that we value their business.”
If you ask Ryan to identify her biggest professional achievement, she’ll claim “nothing special” with typical modesty.
“I’m a regular Joe,” she said. However, she does admit that simply surviving the financial roller coaster of the last few years is an accomplishment in itself. And managing to weather all the changes throughout the last three decades has been a significant feat, according to Ryan.
“While many of my peers are leaving the industry, I plan on riding the wave,” she said. “I believe that we will get back to common sense lending after the dust settles in the mortgage industry.”
Community Involvement
Ryan’s community involvement efforts naturally gravitate toward housing-related causes. She offers her support to a variety of housing agencies, lends a hand with homebuyer assistance classes, and through her position at Bank of America is involved in The Boston Home Center’s Department of Neighborhood Development.
Ryan’s professional affiliations include membership in the Massachusetts Mortgage Bankers Association (MMBA). She served on the New England Community Development Advisory Council for Boston Federal Reserve Bank, and is co-chair of the Mortgage Lending Committee of the Massachusetts Community & Banking Council.
Ryan spent her formative years in the small town of Ashby, and now resides in Boston. She has been married for 27 years to Russell Ryan, a self-employed contractor. She and her husband share their home with a lively Jack Russell “terrorist” named Mike.
Although she is at least 10 years away from retirement age, Ryan is looking forward to the day when she can hang up her title and live at the beach.
“I can dream,” she said.
