New finance program available at Starkey Mortgage

Buying a fixer-upper just became a lot easier in Corpus Christi. Starkey Mortgage Co. launched a new finance program this month that allows homebuyers to include the cost of renovations into their new home mortgage, announced Ricki Whittle, vice president and branch manager of the company’s Corpus Christi office. 
“We are the only company in Corpus Christi that offers this,” Whittle said. “We developed this program as something we can really brag about. I think this is just going to be fabulous.” 
The renovation program includes refinancing. Renovations can be added to a refinance to help homeowners create the house of their dreams from their existing homes at a cheaper interest rate than traditional home equity lines of credit or remodeling loans. 
“The home they are in now becomes the one they want,” Whittle said. “We do the appraisal based on what it will be when renovations are completed.” 
With 19 years’ experience in the home mortgage business, Whittle’s excitement about this new program, as well as about her job in general, stems from the enjoyment she derives from helping people solve the problems they inevitably face when embarking on a house hunt. 
“I love figuring out how to get someone into a home of their dreams,” she said. “So many of them have bad credit, or had it in the past. They are thankful for someone who can direct them, who can help them develop a game plan to get them into a house.” 
Whittle and her staff work to establish a relationship with each client, gathering information and developing a game plan for getting the best loan possible. In Corpus Christi, that is most often a VA or FHA loan. Because of the large number of military personnel living and retiring in the area, Veterans Administration loans are common. Federal Housing Administration loans help first-time buyers as well as those who do not qualify for conventional loans because of a bad credit rating. 
“As a mortgage banker, we loan our own money, we have our own closers, underwriters, processors,” Whittle said. “What I like about being a mortgage banker as opposed to a mortgage broker is that we have control over every single loan.”
Whittle began her career in the mortgage business running a company her husband started in 1999. Within a year, guidelines and regulations began to change so much and so fast that she decided she needed to be with a bigger firm. Nine years ago, she opened the Starkey branch in Corpus Christi. 
“I never looked back,” she said of her move to a larger firm. “Starkey is committed to making a difference in people’s lives. My staff is right there with me on that. They understand that the customer is the most important person in the equation.” 
The walls of Whittle’s office are lined with plaques and awards testifying to the veracity of that statement. Starkey was recently named one of the top 100 mortgage firms in the United States and one of the top 50 companies for which to work. That reward came twice in the past two years. The awards circle other, more colorful signifiers of Whittle’s life: an array of clown art. Yes, after hours, Whittle is a clown.
As one of the founding members of Clowns Who Care, she has been entertaining young patients for the past 20 years at Driscoll’s Children’s Hospital. Known as “Izzy the Dizzy Cheerleader,” Whittle began clowning around because of a friend in chemotherapy. Mary Anne Sinclair had always wanted to be a clown, Whittle said, so when she was diagnosed with cancer, she decided to go for it.
“I never really liked clowns, but, frankly, I didn’t think I was going to have my friend much longer, and I wanted to build as many happy memories as we could,” Whittle said. “Twenty years later, she’s as healthy as a horse and I’m a clown!” 
While she still isn’t a big fan of clowns, she sure likes clowning and she really likes what she and her fellow pranksters do as clowns. 
“You go into every single room with a child and you make them smile,” she said. “Sometimes, it’s the first time these children have smiled in days, or that their parents have smiled. You realize that just that, right there, nothing else, is one of the most fulfilling things you can imagine.”
The weekly routine can be grueling, she said. 
“It’s one of the most exhausting things you can do, even when you’re only there for a few hours,” she continued. “But every time, without exception, you leave saying, ‘Thank you, Jesus, for this opportunity.’ It is such a gift to them, but it is even more a gift to us, the clowns.” 
Although currently on a sabbatical from her 20 years of clowning around, Whittle still gets pleasure from making her clients smile. 
“Our motto is that we are a company where people come first,” she said. “We live up to that slogan.”
Starkey Mortgage, Frost Bank Office Building, 4215 Everhart, Corpus Christi, 361-658-9003.