Understanding Loans: An Interview with Frank Romano of Harbour Equity Partners

1. Tell us about Harbour Equity Partners.

Harbour Equity Partners is a private equity fund. Our resources in investment banking and private banking make it possible for us to offer loans to high net worth borrowers. Harbour Equity Partners has seen the opportunity to help borrowers that do not conform with traditional lending options. Utilizing our private banking resources, Harbour Equity Partners will structure finance options that meet a borrower's end goal.

2. Tell us about Super Jumbo Loans.

Harbour Equity Partners offers investment banking products such as mortgages and asset loans through one of two websites, superjumboloans.info and superjumboloans.net. These sites have an intro video and are designed to detail the programs that we offer to high net worth clients that don't fit the traditional conventional lending guidelines. The private banking products that we offer take into consideration a borrower's financial status and lifestyle. We understand that high net worth borrowers do not typically have W-2 income or fit in the box for most conventional lenders, but rather mostly derive their income from cash flow from their business. In addition, we have created another niche for high net worth borrowers that is common in today's marketplace which helps to offset the issue of appraised value issue.

In short, we see high net worth borrowers showing very little personal income and applying for mortgages over two or three million and more. Our focus is to use the borrower's business cash flow to qualify the loan. In addition, the value niche has become a popular issue as high net worth borrowers have seen a much larger percentage decline in their homes, especially in areas like Florida, Nevada and California. It's very common that we hear today that the borrower owes more than the property is worth, in which case we help to finance that property by utilizing a cross collateralizing method through the borrower's portfolio. This allows us to finance homes up and over 100% LTV which gets the borrower's mortgage straight, keeps their dream home alive, and gives them more time in the home to hopefully see their market turnaround and values increase, putting equity back in the home.

3. What is your background? How did you get involved with Harbour Equity Partners?

Harbour Equity Partners is run by me, Frank Romano. I have a background as an energy trader with two of the largest banks in the world. In that environment your job is to adapt and overcome issues that occur moment to moment. After Enron the environment changed the business and Frank, as did many others, had to move on to a different career. The start of Harbour Equity Partners was more about financing foreclosures; at the height of the credit crisis the credit lines dried up and private equity financing was born. From 2002 to today, Harbour Equity Partners manages 40 originators that help us structure financing for high net worth borrowers. Our goal is to continue to provide finance options for borrowers in the ever-changing and challenging world we live in.

4. How does your business help homebuyers?

If the borrower has a loan of $500,000 or more, has an LTV over 80 or 100%, and/or shows very little personal income, we have options for you. Typically our loan size is over 2 million, and our borrowers show very little gain - and sometimes even losses - on their personal income, combined with values that are below what the borrower owes on the home. These are the realities and challenges in today's world, and this is what we have built our business on overcoming.

5. Who qualifies for your loans?

Borrowers that qualify for private banking products are as follows:

• The borrower should have at least 10% of the loan amount in reserve.
• The borrower should have business cash flow to support the loan size requested if they do not have the standard "adjusted gross income" to qualify
• Credit is really determined more by the borrower's profile; in some cases credit scores are needed over 700, but in cases where a borrower has several million dollars in reserve or more than 50% of the loan amount in reserve combined with business cash flow over $5 million a year, we will forgo the credit requirement, meaning scores can be as low as 600 or sometimes even lower.