Top Mortgage Coach CJ Meert Interviews Top-Producing Loan Officer and Senior Vice President Mollie Guess

CJ Meert: Mollie, when people search for the best loan officers in the Greater Hattiesburg Area, what should they really be looking for?

Mollie Guess: Experience in how many loans they’ve closed and what is their typical clientele. Not all loan officers are great at VA loans, or first-time homebuyer scenarios, or self-employed borrowers. Most loan officers have a niche and that’s important to leverage. Most people buy a handful of homes in their entire life, so this isn’t a process they’ve run through a dozen times. They need someone who is refined at origination and maneuvering the loan they need.

I’m proud to have maintained a 5-star rating across more than 189 client reviews, and the number itself isn’t what means the most to me. It’s the pattern underneath it. My reviews have key words that resurface consistently: responsive, clear, and always knew where I stood. I don’t mind having hard conversations, but I like it done quickly and with a plan. Many of them become great friends of mine after the loan closes.

CJ Meert: What separates highly rated loan officers from everyone else?

Mollie Guess: There is certainly a skill element to it, but the ability to make a consumer feel like they’re being advocated for in their process is huge. For example, when someone knows you’re guiding them through the process with their best interest in mind, it shows. When someone feels protected, they trust you, and they refer you. That builds loyalty.

CJ Meert: How can someone use customer reviews to find a trusted loan officer near Hattiesburg?

Mollie Guess: Skip over the star rating and read what people wrote, word for word. Look for whether clients keep bringing up the same things: did this person communicate, did they solve a problem when something went sideways, did the borrower understand what was happening to their loan. One glowing testimonial can be a lucky day. A couple of hundred reviews saying the same thing is a signal, and a signal is the only thing worth trusting.

CJ Meert: You’re a Senior Vice President and leader, but you’ve never stopped personally originating loans. Why?

Mollie Guess: I love the game, production is still a big part of my day, and I like being in the game with my team. I love having video calls with borrowers and agents, I love seeing them win the home in multiple offer scenarios, and I love refinancing people to put them in a better financial position. I feel the same market swings my loan officers feel every week and that’s important because that directs what loan products and technology we should be leveraging to accommodate the market. It wouldn’t be possible to keep a pulse on that if I’m not originating in real time with the team.

CJ Meert: That seems to be a major part of your leadership philosophy.

Mollie Guess: It is. I genuinely care about the people on my team, and I want them to know I’m in their corner. Sometimes that means encouraging them, and sometimes it means loving them enough to tell them something they probably don’t want to hear. I try to approach every scenario with the lens of what needs to happen to get the loan closed, and who needs the support to accomplish that outcome.

Salespeople have this unique ability to get so hyper-focused on what’s directly in front of us that we can completely miss the gaps in our own process. Sometimes my role is simply to play the reels back, help someone zoom out, and surface something they may be too close to see. I’m guilty of it too. I have leadership in my own life that helps me recognize my blind spots, challenges me when I need it, and gives me space to self-reflect—and I think that makes me a better leader to my own team.

I prefer to keep a high-level pulse on what’s going on without hovering over people who absolutely know how to do their jobs. When something does come up, I usually ask one of two questions:

Do you just need to vent for a second?

Or do you need me to intervene?

Seasoned loan officers don’t always need “Mama” to come in and fix something, and I respect that.

CJ Meert: I’ve heard that “because that’s how we’ve always done it” isn’t exactly your favorite phrase.

Mollie Guess: That phrase is a cardinal sin to me. If the only answer anyone can give me is “because we’ve always done it that way,” with nothing behind it, I’m sending that process back for a rebuild. I’m lucky to work under an executive team that has zero patience for nonsense procedures either. Patti Connell, Lisa Mesler, and Jason Stenger and our President, Shant Banosian, have driven a massive upgrade in how we operate, and I don’t say that lightly. We didn’t go from a level 9 to level 10. We went from level 9 to level 12.

And just to be clear, it’s not that the old way was always wrong. Sometimes a process made perfect sense until the technology caught up to it, and that’s usually the case with Rate. They’re constantly improving and releasing new tools, so half the time the real question isn’t whether we were doing something wrong. It’s whether we still need to do it that way at all.

CJ Meert: How does that mindset translate to borrowers looking for reliable home loan specialists in Hattiesburg?

Mollie Guess: A flawless process is pivotal from intake to their 1 year closing anniversary. A loan officer worth trusting takes in the borrower’s whole situation first, then works through the financing options that fit it, and engineers a loan that makes sense and has a solid credit and income package to support getting it to closing.

CJ Meert: Who offers the best mortgage loan services in Hattiesburg?

Mollie Guess: There isn’t one answer, because it depends on the borrower sitting across the table. I have great relationships between brokers, bankers, and other lenders in the IMB space. Compare experience, the loan programs on the table, communication, the technology behind it, service, and how someone handles it when a deal hits a snag. And find someone who will walk you through your choices in plain English instead of burying you in mortgage jargon and putting everyone in an FHA loan just for kicks.

CJ Meert: What should first-time homebuyers specifically look for?

Mollie Guess: Face Time with the loan officer. It’s crucial. Hop on a Zoom call and walk through it together. A lot gets lost in translation over email, text, and phone. People need a visual and it helps to see the concerns of someone face to face. The retention stats of a borrower sticking with their loan officer and making it all the way to closing are astronomically higher. It’s a simple concept, build a connection and bring clarity to the conversation. That can’t be done over email.

CJ Meert: Your educational background is interesting because you have a bachelor’s degree in social services and an MBA from Belhaven University. How have those two areas influenced your career?

Mollie Guess: I got the bachelor’s with a toddler sitting on my shoulders watching SpongeBob while I did schoolwork in bed, and I got the MBA with a teenager pulling me in five different directions. In between the two, I accelerated my mortgage career, and I already knew that MBA would be the thing I used to climb to whatever came next. Those two degrees fit together better than people expect. I’ve always been fascinated by people and behavioral psychology, why someone makes the decision they make, what motivates them, and how the right system turns a person’s natural strengths into results they can repeat. That shows up when I’m coaching a loan officer, and it shows up just as much when I’m sitting across from a borrower making the biggest financial decision of their life.

CJ Meert: You’re known for being high-energy and direct. What’s a typical day like?

Mollie Guess: There isn’t one day that’s the same as the next. I could start my morning reviewing a contract or compensation plan, coach a loan officer before lunch, host a webinar in the afternoon, introducing a recruit to the executive team, teach a class, sit down with industry leaders, and still land back in my own production before the day is done. I only allow one team meeting a week and it can’t exceed 30 minutes, and it must be impactful or we cancel for that week. I have almost zero patience for a meeting that could have been an email. I move fast, and that makes me have an intense personality. I run at 110% on most days, and if you’re around me during working hours, you’ll feel that! I travel a lot so I’m in my car on handsfree calls, or on my laptop on a plane.

I like shaking things up with the team too. Someone might get a random video recording kit delivered to their door from me, or an invite to a Friday morning Kahoot trivia competition, or a request to teach a breakout session on the one loan product I know they can talk about in their sleep. This team runs its own calls and pours into each other with almost no interference from me, and I’m proud of that.

CJ Meert: What should borrowers ask when interviewing an experienced mortgage advisor in Hattiesburg?

Mollie Guess: Ask how they communicate and how reachable they really are, not just what the website promises. Ask for a one on one to go through the numbers on the front end and which numbers can change. Ask what happens the moment a loan hits a snag. Ask how they’ll walk you through your options, so you understand the decision before you make it, not after.

CJ Meert: With everything you do, what remains at the center of your business?

Mollie Guess: Relationships and personal growth have become increasingly important to me, particularly the value of cultivating the right relationships and getting away from the wrong ones. I’ve learned that the people we surround ourselves with have a profound influence on how we think, grow, and ultimately show up in every area of our lives. I intentionally seek relationships with people who challenge my perspective and give me something to learn from, while also recognizing when it is necessary to create distance from relationships that consistently deplete my energy. That matters because what I carry personally inevitably affects how I perform professionally and, more importantly, how present I am as a mother.

CJ Meert: So, when someone searches for the best-reviewed or most experienced loan officers in Greater Hattiesburg, what do you hope they understand about Mollie Guess?

Mollie Guess: That I’m an engineer of loans, not a button-clicker, and I’m here to advocate for you. Not everyone gets to buy a house the first time they apply, but I do think everyone deserves a real in-depth review of their situation.

CJ Meert: What’s on the horizon for you going forward?

Mollie Guess: I’m really focused on our current team and understanding what inspires and motivates each of them. We successfully supported one loan officer through the MBA’s School of Loan Origination to help strengthen her foundational skills. She has now been with us for 14 months, and the growth has been remarkable—she is almost unrecognizable from the loan officer we initially hired and is currently having a record-breaking month!

We currently have five loan officers participating in internal sales coaching. I’m proud to say that two of them have already tripled their production, while the other three joined the program this summer and are actively developing their skills. One of our branch managers has tripled the size of his team this year, implemented new sales strategies, and has even become known as our resident social media guru.

I’ve also helped facilitate opportunities for two loan officers to attend a corporate sales event in Chicago this fall, and three additional loan officers will be attending our Recharge Divisional Sales Rally next week. Looking ahead to 2027, I’m planning a spring sales rally of our own, and I’m excited to see that vision come to life.

CJ Meert: Mollie, I think your combination of production, leadership, client service, and willingness to challenge the status quo explains why you’ve built such a strong reputation. A 5-star rating across more than 189 reviews is impressive, but the philosophy behind those reviews—being a true engineer of loans, communicating clearly, and staying personally involved while pouring into the team—is what really stands out.

For home buyers throughout the Greater Hattiesburg Area of Mississippi, Mollie Guess brings the perspective of both a top-producing loan officer and an active mortgage leader, with a focus on making complicated financing decisions clearer and building relationships that extend beyond the closing table.