NAWRB Advocates Industry’s First Women-Owned Business Certification

The ""National Association of Women REO Brokerages"":http://www.nawrb.com (NAWRB) intends to fill a void within the distressed services industry by advocating for a uniform, industry certification for women business owners.

[IMAGE]

No mechanism currently exists to ensure that women-owned businesses (WOBs) are actually woman owned and operated, according to the Irvine, California-headquartered organization.

NAWRB released a statement in which it outlined an increasing need for WOB certification. It cites recent regulatory changes at the Small Business Administration (SBA), the impact of financial reform's Provision 342, and the Obama Administration's focus on meeting the long-missed target of 5 percent WOB participation in federal contracting.

In addition, the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act mandates the creation of more than 20 Offices of Minority and Women Inclusion tasked with monitoring an institution's policies regarding women and minority business owners.

[COLUMN_BREAK]

According to NAWRB, certification is central to women business owners competing for business with big lenders. Certified WOBs can take advantage of set-aside targets, and lending and other financial institutions can better track the diversity of their suppliers, vendors, and subcontractors.

Several mortgage default servicing and real estate firms have thrown their support behind NAWRB's movement.

Pam Strom, VP of REO administration and vendor management at ""Green River Capital"":http://www.greenrivercap.com, commented, ""Green River Capital continues to be passionate about promoting diversity within its vendor network, particularly our agents. That is important to our clients and important to us. We are excited about the direction that NAWRB is taking as it provides us with another avenue to foster diversity in our agent network.""

While minorities have access to federally regulated certification through the Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA), women business owners are faced with ""self-certification"" and ""self-policing."" The NAWRB cites the ""MBDA's Web site"":http://www.mbda.gov, which states, ""… the federal government does not require any formal certification for women-owned small businesses.""

""NAWRB is an organization we've watched since its inception last year,"" said Naomi Moon, owner of ""Pacific Moon Real Estate, Inc."":http://www.reobroker.com/brokerpage.asp?brokerid=36, a minority and woman-owned business. ""Their move into certification is certainly going to fill a void because their process and programs are designed specifically to link women business owners, lenders, loan servicers, and city governments.""