Sharon DeCastro
Jesse Decker
First Guaranty Mortgage Corporation
Sagent
Sharon DeCastro is a certified public accountant with nearly 20 years of experience that she uses to lead the accounting team at FGMC, where she serves as senior vice president, controller. As an immigrant who studied accounting in the Philippines and gained experience working for a firm in Singapore, DeCastro has shown a lifetime of determination and commitment to her career. When DeCastro first joined FGMC in 2016, she took ownership over reorganizing the books and setting up processes that would allow them to be more efficient. These processes are proving to be essential years later as the company experiences more and more growth. DeCastro manages the accounting and accounts payable departments to ensure FGMC’s finances are accurate, managed responsibly and meet all legal requirements. Her deadline-driven workflow made her teams well equipped for the challenges faced in 2020. While the mortgage industry experienced the slow down and eventual eruption of volume, her team was able to remain calm and ensure they were managing their cash flow properly. DeCastro’s ability to be nimble and confident while delivering results was astronomically important to the firm and its investors throughout 2020 and 2021. However, DeCastro’s most notable quality is her care for the well-being of her team and FGMC. Her humility translates to a great company culture in her department and trust among the team.
Within months of joining Sagent, Jesse Decker scaled her team from 15 employees to over 60 as she helped the nation’s top financial institutions rethink their approach to the onslaught of borrower requests by providing real-time and human support at every turn. In 2020, Decker spearheaded a revamped customer success strategy aimed at better understanding and serving the needs of customers. Primed by her background modernizing mortgage originations as customer success lead for two of the industry’s top fintech firms, Roostify and Cloudvirga, Decker infused the consumer-first sensibility seen in the origination space into her team’s COVID response. Her role on the front lines positioned her to both redirect and accelerate Sagent’s product roadmaps, rolling out its growing and evolving suite of products to customers at scale. Within a year of joining the executive team, she implemented new customer success team processes and tool changes and rapidly scaled the Sagent customer success team by more than 300% to respond to the needs of customers and their borrowers during the pandemic. Additionally, she coordinated a company-wide partnership with the National Association of Minority Mortgage Bankers to improve Sagent’s diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives aimed at supporting and growing non-traditional lending and recruiting strategies. Above all, Decker makes sure Sagent’s customer success strategies protect servicers and borrowers alike.
Angela Dunham
Sarah Edelman
OJO Labs
Fannie Mae
As chief operating officer at OJO Labs, Angela Dunham drives the company forward everyday with a culture of innovation, empathy and impact. Dunham brings more than 25 years of experience to OJO Labs in driving operational success, optimizing performance and building strong teams. Throughout 2020, Dunham has focused on implementing foundational training to support the development of all employees, despite the unusual circumstances. She introduced Real Colors, a personality instrument, which helped employees better understand the dynamics of OJO Labs and how all personalities play a role in creating a great culture. While Dunham oversees all facets of OJO Labs’ operations, her greatest contribution to the company has been her role in shaping the company culture. She has spearheaded the development of a cohesive, mission-driven culture across five separate offices. Additionally, Dunham rallied her entire company around its purpose to level the playing field for all homebuyers and sellers. While she has always been a champion of diversity, equity and inclusion, the nationwide reckoning with racism last summer lit a fire for her to double down on DEI initiatives. Dunham established initiatives to raise awareness of DEI issues and build empathy by bringing in experts on race and home buying who can shine new light on the specific challenges within the real estate industry.
Sarah Edelman has decades of experience in community development, affordable housing policy and program implementation. She has become a trusted voice on affordable homeownership within Fannie Mae and across the housing industry. In her current role as director of affordable initiatives, Edelman’s goal is to decrease the cost of housing for low and moderate-income households and create opportunities to build wealth through homeownership. She is directly responsible for setting Fannie Mae’s strategy to meet the credit needs of underserved borrowers living in high-needs rural regions, manufactured homes or in neighborhoods with rising housing costs or distressed properties. Every day, Edelman helps Fannie Mae deliver on its commitment to sustainability and affordability. She was instrumental in developing the company’s Duty to Serve efforts and developing the plans to serve these markets more effectively. Since Edelman stood up Fannie Mae’s DTS initiative in 2018, the company has significantly increased its purchases of loans in DTS markets. She also participates in areas of work outside of DTS and consistently encourages colleagues to prioritize the needs of underserved borrowers first and to deliver impactful solutions that will improve access to affordable housing. Additionally, Edelman has testified before Congress on housing finance issues.
SVP, Controller
EVP, Customer Success
38 ❱ HOUSINGWIRE
Chief Operating Officer
Director of Affordable Initiatives
AUGUST 2021