I recently purchased a home through the USDA program and Mat Stewart of Rock River Financial…read morehandled the loan. As a first time buyer, I was completely clueless about how the process worked and Mat was always more than patient in answering my questions and concerns, as well as in helping me to correct the numerous mistakes I made along the way. When the listing agent and seller made several serious mistakes of their own, Mat was indispensable in getting the process back on track, spending a great deal more time and effort than is the norm to do so. He never gave up on helping me, and there were many points at which I wouldn't have blamed him if he had, since what should have been a pretty straight forward process turned into a long and arduous ordeal. He even had to secure a new underwriter because the loan became so complicated for various reasons, none of which were his fault. He truly went above and beyond the call of duty to help me move into my dream home, and I highly doubt most loan agents would have stuck by me through all of the mishaps and stressors that cropped up along the way. I can't possibly recommend or thank him enough for all of his help, sacrifice and patience in this endeavor and I feel that I would have given up at several points had it not been for him. If you are in need of a loan agent, you absolutely can't go wrong with Mat Stewart!

I recently worked with Rock River Financial to buy my first house. Mat and his team were very…read moreknowledgeable, professional, and friendly. I had a lot of questions and they were more than willing to answer every one of them, and responded quickly, too. They were efficient and kept me up to date throughout the process. I found them to be easy to work with and felt like they genuinely cared about getting me the best mortgage - I wasn't just another numbered applicant. I was really impressed with their expertise, honesty, and promptness and definitely recommend them!

Elizabeth Smith and her team are incredible. They were very thorough got us a wonderful rate and it…read moremoved very quickly...three weeks from beginning to end

Communication and keeping one's word is vital in a business relationship. Elizabeth Smith, did…read moreneither. I sent her all of the documents that she requested and asked her to let me know if she needed anything else. Two weeks passed with no contact. Multiple emails, texts, and phone calls to her went without reply. When she finally did contact us, she said she had been sick and would contact us the next day. She did not. When we finally heard from her (after having to leave yet another voicemail message) she was curt and claimed that she had sent us an email, which we never received, although we had received every other email. Then upon telling her we did not receive it, she told us to go somewhere else and hung up.

My husband and I had the privilege of working with Jocelyn in the summer of 2016 to buy our first…read morehome. The process from start to finish was nothing but amazing. Jocelyn & the staff at Resident Lending Group were always happy to answer all of our questions, no matter how trivial. Neither my husband nor I had ever applied for a mortgage before, but Jocelyn made the process simple & straightforward. She told us about all the documents that we would need to submit & was even quick to help us via email when need be. Granted, the process of applying for a mortgage is not great fun, but Jocelyn & the staff at Resident Lending made it as painless & straightforward as possible. In short, if you have the opportunity to work with Jocelyn and the staff at Resident Lending, you should take it as they are the most professional & straightforward mortgage brokers around.

Jocelyn is freaking amazing. Through the last couple of months she has been ON THE BALL. I have…read morenever experienced such great customer service and close contact with a lender before...and I sell cars for a living and deal with lenders frequently. Thank you so much Jocelyn for all of your hard work and making this process so easy! I cannot recommend her enough. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Shana was great! I moved from out of state, and came to Oregon a couple of times to look at places…read moreahead of time. She was always available, and so very nice. When I was back home, selling my current place, she sent me notices of places that I might be interested in. The second time I came to town, she spent a LOT of time with me, looking at places, and I finally found my dream home! Even after escrow closed, she was there to answer questions, and gave me information about my new town. I will definitely use her if I ever move again! One more thing, Coldwell Banker has a free handyman service that does many services, and they are available for the duration of you owning your home! I have already used them, and they were quick, professional, and nice.

Carrie Hamilton at RE/MAX is a 5-Star Real Estate Agent! She is professional, patient, makes the…read moreprocess fun, and very knowledgeable about the industry and the market in the Willamette Valley. With the market as crazy as it is right now, it is so important to have a great Realtor by your side to help you navigate and be on top of new listings as they pop-up. I have had the pleasure of working with Carrie on a couple of transaction and am most certainly looking forward to working with her again!

I wish I could rate MBI with zero stars. Jim Morrison never got back to us, we constantly had to…read morechase him around. He set us back months in purchasing a house, because of his horrible advice. I would never ever recommend going there. Very unprofessional and just ended up holding us back in our home purchasing journey.

I have used Jim at MBI for multiple property refi's and he has made everyone as easy as a refi…read morecould be, he came highly recommended by our realtor and that was 7 years ago. Still using Jim for our refi needs.

Brenda was actually not our first realtor. The first showed up at our door with an interested buyer…read moreat a time when we weren't ready to sell, but was polite and kept in occasional contact for months until we were. My wife had mentioned to the gentleman that it would be nice to be able to sell to the buyer they had and not to have to put the house on the market, but at no point did the realtor suggest that it may not be in our best interests monetarily to sell without putting the house on the market. When it came time to sign the contract retaining the realtor, I had a couple of days before fallen and would later find out fractured two of my ribs. I was in a lot of pain and not exactly thinking clearly, but the realtor made my wife and I feel pressured to sign on the spot before going to urgent care that day. We were also shown a CMA that estimated the value of our house more than 15% below what it would ultimately sell for, but "coincidently" was the amount the buyer they had was willing to pay. The relationship quickly soured and after a couple of weeks of back and forth which included the realtor's very condescending superior telling us she had worked on the CMA and our house was actually worth even less and that they had valued it generously, they finally let us out of the exclusivity contract. I only bring that all that up in our review because working with her was an absolute night and day difference. At no point was she ever pushy like the other realtor or condescending like his superior, and she just had a trustworthy vibe that the previous realtor, although polite, did not. Brenda came and took a look at our house, worked up a far more comprehensive CMA that came in much higher than the other realtor's CMA, and after having some other members of her team come take a look at the house actually suggested we price it even higher than the CMA indicated. We were a little bit nervous that maybe things had swung too far in the opposite direction and we were asking too much in the current housing market, but it turned out Brenda and her team had nailed it. The house went up on the market, we had a few showings, and offers came in very quickly; several which were quite a bit higher even than the already raised asking price. We went with an offer that wouldn't close for a couple of months thinking it would give us plenty of time to find a new house to move in to. During this time, Brenda's colleague Leslie was our buyer's agent. We were using the internet to find homes we were interested in, so we didn't need that part of her services but still wanted an experienced agent to help make sure everything went smoothly and it turned out we would have been in big trouble without her! In the process of finding the house we would buy, Leslie drove well out of her (as far as I can tell from a quick web search at least) normal service area on at least one, maybe two different occasions to view houses with us. She never complained or even mentioned that she usually doesn't go out that far. We settled on a new construction house that required non-refundable earnest money. We had no reason at the time to think that there would be any problems, but just three days before closing the person buying our house backed out with no warning and by then the other offers were no longer on the table. It was obviously not Brenda's fault, but we were absolutely crushed because we couldn't imagine getting such good offers again, especially since we would have to sell very quickly to close on the house we wanted to buy. On top of that, we would lose the earnest money. Brenda and Leslie sprang into action, with Leslie managing a very busy open house and convincing the notoriously inflexible new construction company to agree to push back the closing date not just once, but twice, and Brenda lining up several private showings in a very, very short time frame. Once again, we had several offers above asking price. In the end, we came out with almost just as much as the initial offer that had fallen through and were able to get the house we wanted. Throughout the entire messy process, both Brenda and Leslie were very patient with our constant questions and always got back to us very quickly even on weekends and at times we would not have expected such quick replies. They went above and beyond and treated us like family in a way that may have been more common decades ago but seems very rare these days, and their supportiveness and quick action really got us through the period where it felt like everything was falling apart. I honestly can't think of adequate words to express how grateful we are and can only hope that this review will bring some business their way because they deserve as much as they can handle.

Leslie was amazing to work with start to finish! She helped us craft competitive offers, even in…read morethe heat of the 2021 housing market, and eventually land our dream home in far less time than we expected it to take. She was always responsive, knowledgeable, professional, kind, cheerful, and incredibly helpful. We couldn't have asked for a better or smoother experience!!

Karen was absolutely awesome goes above and beyond for her clients highly recommend herread more

Karen managed the sale of my home in NE Salem, Oregon, and did so with professionalism and…read morepatience. She answered questions and concerns without judging me for their stupidity and guided me when I asked for guidance. I am indebted to Karen and recommend her without reservation for anyone's realty needs.