Message from the President

Mickey Vandenberg

My May message is a little later than usual, as I have been traveling extensively last month and this month. As we all know, if you’ve been out of office, it takes a minute to catch up!

We had a successful Board of Directors meeting on April 13^th at Mike Belote’s offices in Sacramento. A big topic of discussion was the CEA and EIC joint response letter for the FinCEN Proposed Rulemaking. We sent you a NewsFlash on April 18^th sharing the response letter to FinCEN addressing the Proposed Rulemaking. In case you missed it, you can read about it here. Be sure to reach out to your regional President and/or Directors if you want to know more about the Board of Directors, the meeting topics, and what you can do to get involved.

At the beginning of this month, I attended and spoke at the American Escrow Association’s (AEA) Educational Conference at the Palace Station in Las Vegas, NV, where Jennifer Smith from Nevada was installed as the incoming 2024-2024 President. An exceptional line up of speakers provided great education and insights. The sessions touched on topics of FinCEN Proposed Rulemaking and the State of the Union Address, which calls for the elimination of title insurance policies for certain federally insured loans, a reduction in closing costs, and reformation of the title industry. In addition, there was a variety of other topics such as Good Funds, Real Time Payments (RTP) and FedNow, and the importance of choosing an experienced notary, regardless of whether that is a paper notary or a Remote Online Notary (RON). All of these topics currently do or soon will impact the escrow desk and therefore it’s critical, now more than ever, for you to stay informed and get involved.

One of the presentations that really resonated with me was based on the book Who Moved My Cheese by Spencer Johnson, M.D. If you haven’t read it yet, I would highly recommend it. It is a reminder for all of us to be adaptable and flexible. Our world has become agile and will continue to be going forward with all of the changes on the horizon.

Again, I encourage you to ask others in our industry to join CEA now. It’s very simple: CEA needs you. Membership is the lifeblood of our association! CEA and AEA are here to keep you in the know, but we need YOUR support. Continued and new membership is absolutely vital to the success of our associations. I thank you in advance for participating in our success!