Mutual of Omaha Mortgage (MOM) has acquired the assets of Keller Mortgage – the lending arm of real estate holding company kwx – for an undisclosed amount.
Keller Mortgage will be operated as an independent division alongside Mutual of Omaha’s existing forward and reverse mortgage division, MOM said in an e-mailed response.
“This transaction brings together two leaders in the mortgage industry, leveraging the strengths of each to provide outstanding products and services to homebuyers from coast to coast,” Mutual of Omaha Mortgage president Terry Connealy said in a statement on Monday.
Keller Williams has retained a stake in the Keller Mortgage division, the company said in an e-mailed response. Changes to the leadership at Keller Mortgage are unknown, the two firms said when asked about a potential shuffling.
“Our KW customers will have access to an even more comprehensive slate of mortgage services from a trusted brand with more than a century of business experience,” Keller Williams co-founder and executive chairman Gary Keller said in a statement.
Mutual of Omaha Mortgage, a subsidiary of Mutual of Omaha, offers home financing and refi options as well as reverse mortgage products. The lender said it had about 1,300 employees and 140 branches as of January 31 — prior to the transaction.
The San Diego-based lender had a production volume of $8.24 billion in 2022, a drop from $11.23 billion in origination the year prior, according to mortgage data platform Modex.
While Keller Mortgage declined to disclose its number of employees, the NMLS shows that the Ohio-based lender has 42 branches and sponsors 110 mortgage loan originators.
The company laid off 150 employees in October 2021, which was followed by at least two rounds of layoffs in 2022. Keller William’s spokesperson Darryl Frost said the lender restructured the mortgage operations group due to the “macroeconomic market conditions” in May and October 2022 without specifying the size of the layoffs.
The lender’s origination volume declined to $1.24 billion in 2022 from $4.16 billion in 2021, according to Modex. More than 80% of its volume in 2022 came from purchase mortgages and about 19% from refis, according to the data.
