As the mortgage industry planned for 2026, it anticipated a strong purchase market, benefitting from a declining interest rate environment.

Early reports were lining up for a good spring homebuying season. In late February, several sources, including the Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey, had the conforming 30-year fixed close to or under the 6%. This led National Mortgage News to ask submitters about their plans on how to approach the purchase business this year.

But nothing is ever certain in the real world, and the conflict with Iran led to higher inflation, and this resulted in mortgage rates increasing. Lender Price data on the National Mortgage News website had the 30-year at 6.44% on April 28, 37 basis points over where it was two months earlier.

While higher mortgage rates do affect affordability, it also increases an originator's reliance on purchase business.

"Accelerate and maintain current focus on relationship driven sales, not transactional," said Kurt Strandson of Pinnacle Mortgage, the No. 51-ranked originator. "Our stance is that if all parties get to the closing table and do not feel compelled to refer us to their friends and families, we have not done our job."

Obviously, referrals from and prospecting to real estate agents was an oft-cited source. Others have homebuilder relationships. Getting in the door in the first place is key.

"By continuing to meet customers face-to-face via referrals and open houses, social media posts and networking with new and existing industry professionals," said the No. 70 originator, Shawn Malkou of X2 Mortgage.

The plan can be as simple as just putting yourself out where people are, this response from Shirley Stange, the 75th-ranked originator from Wings Credit Union, said: "Making sure I stay on top of the minds of referring agents by staying active in the community."

The Top Producers Survey is open to individual loan officers who work at depository, nonbank (including third party originators) and mortgage brokerage firms in the United States.

The survey covers mortgage loans originated during 2025, plus the submitters' views on issues affecting the industry at large as well as their business. These included open ended questions on customer retention as well as the expected shift in 2026 to a purchase market.

The Top Producers survey has been in existence for 28 years and is the successor to those conducted by Broker magazine and Origination News (former National Mortgage News sister publications) as well as Mortgage Originator Magazine, which Arizent owns the content rights to.

Submissions were made by the participants or their representatives. The information was verified to the best of our ability but National Mortgage News cannot claim the absolute veracity of the data. Some entries might have been removed due to submission errors or following the check on the data.

Today we reveal the loan originators ranked between 51 and 100. On Tuesday, we listed those between 101 and 175, while on Monday we published the names of those between 176 and 275.

Check back on the National Mortgage News website for the top 50 mortgage originators in the country. Additional cuts of data, including top women and by number of units produced, will be published shortly thereafter.