Former HUD Deputy Secretary and FHA Commissioner Brian D. Montgomery, along with four colleagues, have jointly launched Gate House Strategies LLC [1], a new advisory venture. Along with Montgomery, Assistant Secretary for Public & Indian Housing Hunter Kurtz, Acting Assistant Secretary for Policy Development & Research Michael Marshall, Deputy Assistant Secretary and FHA Chief Risk Officer Keith Becker, and Senior Advisor to the FHA Commissioner Dror Oppenheimer, will all serve as Founding Partners.
The new firm will focus on FHA/Ginnie Mae/HUD and Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac policy and programmatic compliance and litigation support, including origination, servicing, claims and property disposition; strategic growth opportunities; technology; public housing; and disaster recovery.
The firm’s partners have a combined 100 years of housing experience through executive positions at FHA, HUD, Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac.
Montgomery served as Deputy Secretary at HUD, and is the only person to be confirmed to lead the FHA twice, where he served as Assistant Secretary for Housing and Federal Housing Commissioner for a total of 6.5 years under three different U.S. Presidents.
Kurtz has spent his professional career working in the affordable housing industry at the state, local, and federal levels. Most recently, Kurtz served as the Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing (PIH) at HUD, where he was responsible for ensuring safe, decent, and affordable housing for the roughly 3.5 million families participating in HUD’s public housing and Native American housing programs.
Marshall recently served as Acting Assistant Secretary for the Office of Policy Development and Research (PD&R) at HUD, advising the Secretary and Deputy Secretary on policy matters, research and demonstrations, economic information, innovation, international programs, and philanthropic initiatives.
With more than 37 years in the mortgage industry, Becker recently served as CRO for FHA, responsible for implementing the agency’s comprehensive risk governance infrastructure, and the independent monitoring and reporting of FHA’s financial, mortgage credit, counterparty credit, and operational risks.
With more than 35 years in the mortgage industry, Oppenheimer recently served as Senior Advisor to the FHA Commissioner, where he was responsible for advising the Commissioner on updating FHA’s Single-Family servicing policies to support sustainable homeownership, aligning FHA with industry best practices for Single Family servicing, and supporting FHA’s technology modernization initiative, FHACatalyst.
“I am honored to join my former HUD colleagues as we continue our work in the affordable housing and disaster recovery sectors into the private sector,” said Montgomery. “I am proud of the work our HUD team accomplished during our tenure, in particular dealing with COVID-19, and look forward to working with HUD stakeholders as they continue to assist their vulnerable constituencies and customers.”
Gate House Strategies (GHS) will seek to bring a new level of focus and diligence to their clients and other stakeholders, in particular, as they work toward achieving more equity and fairness for the groups they serve and support.
“While at HUD, we worked hard to help ensure we were delivering services to all our vulnerable citizens, and doing so in an efficient and timely manner especially as COVID-19 roiled the nation,” said Kurtz, who will serve GHS as Founding Partner. “Our recent perspective and experience on HUD’s many programs will help PHAs, local governments, non-profits, and others as they continue to move forward.”
The GHS team has extensive expertise in the operations of government-backed mortgage programs, including FHA (forward and HECMs; Multi-Family, and Healthcare), GNMA, and the GSEs. In addition, GHS team is deep experience with federal and state disaster recovery processes, public housing authorities, and community development programs, including the appropriations process, grant-making, compliance, and political intelligence.
“From day one, we led the effort to assist thousands of homeowners impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic,” said Oppenheimer, Founding Partner of GHS. “We look forward to assisting mortgage servicers and other stakeholders as they deal with the unprecedented number of homeowners coming out of COVID-19 forbearance in the near future.”
On Wednesday, June 9, Montgomery will take part in the Five Star Institute’s 2021 Government Forum [2]. This virtual event will offer insights from mortgage servicing industry leaders, as well as counterparts from government agencies, in an open and impactful dialogue on the industry’s most pressing issues.
Montgomery will take part in the “Eye on the Horizon” session, a recap of the day’s discussions, highlighting key takeaways of the day. Joining him on the panel will be John Bell III, Deputy Director of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs; Michael Huff, VP, Director of Government Relations, Federal Home Loan Bank of Atlanta; and Michael Waldron, General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer, Community Loan Servicing LLC.
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Click here [2] for more information or to register for the Five Star Institute’s virtual 2021 Government Forum.