I entered the mortgage business in the early 80s by accident.

I was headed toward a career in politics and needed to make a living while I was working on issues when a friend suggested the mortgage industry. We both started at nearly the same time and never looked back.

I started as a loan officer and immediately caught the bug. It was exciting. I liked dealing with financial instruments and did some agreements with large home builders.

I would meet with families who were buying homes and help them with their finances. I liked to know their stories, their kids and how excited they were to own a home. Back in those days we used to meet people at their kitchen table.

I’m a big believer that housing is part of what makes the American dream. You can call that an illness, but I love the business despite what we’ve gone through.

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I stayed with the bank for 17 years and ultimately left when I was senior vice president running its national lending.

I was recruited to Freddie Mac in 1998 and served as senior vice president, head of the single family housing unit. I was later recruited by Wells Fargo to run their wholesale lending, the platform that delivers mortgage products to mortgage brokers. I was traveling nonstop.

Eventually I was contacted by the administration and asked by the president to be assistant secretary of housing and Federal Housing Administration commissioner. I was confirmed by the Senate in July 2009.

Working for the government was never in my plans, but I determined to do my best to get FHA, particularly the mutual mortgage insurance portfolio, stabilized and back on track.

We launched a significant crackdown on bad players in the industry. I shut down or suspended close to 2,000 lenders.

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With the help of Congress we were able to get the FHA bill through Congress. Some say my administration saved FHA from having the funds go negative which would’ve been a terrible outcome.

I also created a new office of management. Forever more, they’ll have the risk management leadership and focus that wasn’t there under previous administrations.

I always had it in my plan to help work through the crisis that FHA was facing and then return to the private sector, where my career started and will likely finish.

My options were either the Mortgage Bankers Association or to go back to the industry as a practitioner at one of the lending institutions.

I’ve always been active with MBA, attending events and working with its senior leadership. There’s a lot of policy that’s coming out currently and is going to happen over the next year both legislatively and through the regulators.

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I still believe that there needs to be a strong voice for the industry to help avoid unintended consequences and ensure rational policy gets made. We need to create not only a safe industry for consumers going forward, but one that is viable and functions so that homeownership and rental housing get financed.

— Interview with Vanessa Small

David Stevens

Position:President and chief executive of the Mortgage Bankers Association, a national association representing the real estate finance industry, headquartered in the District.

Career highlights:Commissioner, Federal Housing Administration; president and chief operating officer of Long and Foster Companies; senior vice president, Freddie Mac; executive vice president, Wells Fargo; senior vice president, World Savings Bank.

Personal:Lives in the District with his wife. They have four children.

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