Opes Advisors

I worked with Paula Harrell on 3 different loans.
1– $ 850,000 multiple units in Oakland –August to December of 2014.
2– $ 920,000 house in Santa Cruz October 2014 to January 2015
3– $ 745,000 duplex in Napa March to June 2015
Paula is charismatic and never gives up. Unfortunately her positive nature promise loans OPES can NOT deliver making me fail a 1031 exchange which have huge tax consequences and ultimately forcing me (LAST MINUTE) to work with their private lenders at a huge cost. And when I said forcing me is because from my point of view I didn’t have an alternative due to timing… I’m sure on their end OPES would argue that they saved the day. In my opinion, it would have being better if they would denied the loan at the beginning of the process and not last minute…
I ended up getting a loan with their hard money lenders (whom I am extremely grateful and will review on a separate Unilocal)
I just want to caution people about OPES as I believe Paula is a great person to work with (even thought she hardly picks up calls and only respond via text and there is always some bad luck going on with her friends, phone etc that does not allow her to pick up calls) but OPES is not a good lender to work with.
After hundreds of pages faxes to them, months of work put into paper work and approve letter at the end I did not get any of the loans with them.
But I paid for 2 appraisals for each loan.

I was recently doubting, but since one of the partners very recently took over my loan, it has been completely professional and customer oriented.
Also, I have to give recognition to this company as I wrote the CEO down about my problem with my existing loan officer, and the CEO was the first to contact me (and on a holiday weekend). That says a lot about the company.
I have to change my rating and have high regards at this point about the principals of the company and their integrity.
Heidi

We just bought our first home with Sue Florence. It was a pretty terrifying process, and we were incredibly thankful to have Sue at our side.
She was so patient, taking hours to talk us through our 6 million questions and carefully discuss our options– FHA vs. conventional loans, down payment vs. monthly costs, etc. We never encountered unpleasant surprises around fees or payments. Her flexibility was great– we work long hours, and she accommodated our schedules without batting an eye; we would send her emails in the wee hours and hear back right away.
As we went through the offer process (over and over), Sue was a true advocate, reaching out to sellers to vouch for us and turning around recommendation letters in record time. Best of all, Sue helped us to keep calm and maintain perspective, and celebrated success when the time finally came. We wouldn’t have thought to take photos or save the pens from our mortgage signing, but Sue did, and we didn’t realize how lucky we were until after the fact. The personal attention was so key– I’d recommend Sue/​Opes wholeheartedly.

I worked with Sue Florence on financing my new home and she was fantastic. I know many people get their mortgages through a bank, but I do not know why they wouldn’t go through a full-​service broker like Sue. It was almost like being on auto-​pilot; she took care of everything.
If you’ve ever bought a home, you know that there are mounds and mounds of paperwork required. It can get overwhelming at times, but Sue was with me every step of the way, and gave me «gentle reminders» when I didn’t get documents to her on time. I really needed that extra attention since my work schedule is so busy.
In addition, Sue had access to «products» that my bank would not have, and ultimately was able to get me into my dream home, which would not have been possible with traditional financing. Plus, she is really fun and funny.
The home-​buying process can be very stressful, but working with Sue made things so smooth. I highly recommend her, you will not regret it!

I have used Sue Florence as my loan agent twice and both times has started out awesome, and gradually gotten worse as the process nears close. Many times she has not responded to emails, botched up loan documents or not communicated to me during the process about important things. I would definitely not use her again. As the saying goes, fool me once, shame on you, Sue. Fool me twice, shame on me. But fool you next time, shame on you for not heeding my advice in this review! :)

Ryan and his associate Michael were absolutely fabulous mortgage brokers! My real estate agent told me having a good mortgage broker is just as important as a good real estate agent. After having gone through the home buying process for the first time, I now know that that comment was absolutely true.

In the world of mortgage brokers and lenders, Ryan Ogata is one of the absolute best. It’s very refreshing to find Mortgage Bankers whom act on their clients behalf, especially in today’s market. Everyone at Opes Advisors – Ryan, Charlene, Austin, George and Michael – proves that time and again. There’s nothing more comforting in knowing that my clients are in great hands, even when they are not in mine.

Ryan has helped my wife and I with 4 loans: 2 purchases and then 2 refi.‘s so, needless to say, I have spent many meetings and phone calls developing a relationship with him.
As a freelancer with wide variety of income sources I have always been a poor candidate for loans even though I make good money and have a great credit score. The banks are scared of anything that doesn’t fit the «normal» mold even if it is low risk. Contacting banks directly was useless, but Ryan was consistently able to show them that I was worth giving a loan to and got us good rates each time. The amount of aggrevation and time Ryan saved us was immeasurable.
He and his whole gang guy are always friendly, very helpful, returned our calls promptly and were extremely patient with our millions of questions. Ryan is not your average suit and tie financial guy and I really appreciate his sense of humor and ability to educate me.
If you are thinking about buying a home and you have no idea how to get qualified or want to save some cash by refinancing its worth giving him a call.

Ryan Ogata succeeded where other mortgage advisors failed (i.e. Bank of America, Wells Fargo, First Republic etc.) Ryan recently helped me purchase my first home — despite lots of factors that made my particular loan situation difficult. He knows the industry, its players and the necessary techniques to get the best loan possible.
I was up against very tight deadlines and Ryan FOUGHT HARD in working with the lender and the title company to make miracles happen in the end. I closed on a REO property in under a month, and that’s even with my going back to renegotiate the purchase price.
Ryan is always available, responds quickly, explains things well to first-​time home buyers, and is polite, professional and caring.
If you’re shopping around for a mortgage, definitely give Ryan a call!