ClosingCorp is now looking for a new chief executive officer as the company tells HousingWire that Brian Benson is out as the company’s CEO.
Benson joined the company as CEO in October 2013, after spending 16 years with CoreLogic.
In December 2015, Benson was named one of the inaugural winners of HousingWire Magazine’s Vanguard Award, as one of the leading executives in the housing industry.
At the time, Benson told HousingWire Magazine that he expected the company’s revenue to double in 2016 and again in 2017, due to the company’s ability to deal with governmental regulations, especially the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s TILA-RESPA Integrated Disclosure Rule.
And it’s apparently due to that growth that the company's board felt that Benson was no longer the right person to lead the company, which provides intelligence for closing costs and service providers in the residential real estate industry.
“Given the company’s significant growth — growing by approximately 90% — the board decided that ClosingCorp needs a more seasoned CEO with experience in a high-growth technology environment,” the company said in a statement.
“As chief executive officer, Brian and his team helped position the company to prosper going forward,” the company continued. “We thank Brian for his significant contributions to ClosingCorp.”
Replacing Benson, at least on an interim basis, will be James Bolger, chief financial officer, and Kamel Boulos, chief technology officer. Both will share the duties of CEO and report directly to the board of directors.
ClosingCorp also said that its board has formed a search committee to find a “permanent and experienced” CEO, and is looking for someone with operations and software-as-a-service (SaaS) “expertise” for the position.
“The board strongly believes in the seasoned executive staff and is looking for a CEO that will complement the team,” ClosingCorp said.
Staffan Encrantz, the company’s chairman of the board, said that the company is looking forward to continuing its growth under new leadership.
"The board has been very pleased with the company’s performance and expects that the company will continue this upward trajectory both with the current interim changes and even more so under the new seasoned CEO leadership,” Encrantz said.
Benson’s LinkedIn page lists him as the current managing partner of BNS Insights. In this role, Benson provides “specialized advisory services in data analytics/mortgage technologies.”
Benson joined the company as CEO in October 2013, after spending 16 years with CoreLogic. Benson’s LinkedIn profile lists his last position at CoreLogic as vice president of sales.
According to Benson’s now-scrubbed bio, he built “award-winning teams with a consistent record of sales and revenue growth.”
While at CoreLogic, Benson also “helped execute and integrate large-scale acquisitions of Transamerica Intellitech, Basis100 and several other businesses.”
Earlier in his career, Benson spent 10 years at First American Real Estate Solutions, working his way up from area sales director to regional vice president of sales and finally to vice president of the Western region.
Benson also spent 10 years in the Coast Guard, holding several leadership roles in Hawaii, Alaska, Japan and West Africa.
As part of Benson’s inclusion in that the HW Vanguard list, he was asked about his philosophy for success in business.
“To me the secret to success is to be honest, transparent and always treat people with respect,” Benson said. “I've found that you don't always have to exude brilliance, because personal brilliance in and of itself rarely gets things done.”
At the time, Benson said that the company was prepared for the new normal of the mortgage business.
“The whole industry is in a lot of ways reinventing itself,” Benson said at the time.
“The devil is in the details. As a middleman you have to think about clients and the people participating in this transaction,” Benson continued. “Accuracy is in the eye of the regulators in this case, matching it up and synthesizing it so you can get a streamlined transaction.”
Benson said that ClosingCorp’s ongoing challenge will be to educate those in the business and make product modifications that allow transactions to proceed in timeframes that provide a good experience for consumers.
“I have tremendous empathy for what businesses have to go through,” Benson said said. “They’ve been under heavy scrutiny and regulatory Armageddon. We’re TRID ready and complaint. The good news is that we feel like we’re in a unique and amazing place to make that transpire for clients.”
But now, Benson will no longer be a part of ClosingCorp’s future.
