Mark Bomchill says he'd like to forget the year he spent hustling mortgages for Ameriquest Capital Corp. in suburban Minneapolis.
Slugging down Red Bull caffeine drinks, sales agents would work the phones hour after hour, he said, trying to turn cold calls into lucrative "sub-prime" mortgages -- high-cost loans made to people with spotty credit.
The demands were relentless: One manager prowled the aisles between desks like "a little Hitler," Bomchill said, hounding agents to make more calls and push more loans, bragging that he hired and fired people so fast that one worker would be cleaning out his desk as his replacement came through the door.
"It was like a boiler room," said Bomchill, 37. "You produce, you make a lot of money. Or you move on. There's no real compassion or understanding of the position they're putting their customers in."
Indeed, Bomchill -- who said he left Ameriquest because he didn't like the way the company treated its employees and customers, and now works as a mortgage broker -- contends that the drive to close deals and grab six-figure salaries led many Ameriquest employees astray: They forged documents, hyped customers' creditworthiness and "juiced" mortgages with hidden rates and fees.
Such claims are not unusual against sub-prime lenders, which are a frequent target of consumer groups.
Ameriquest, however, has been held up as an industry model since agreeing in 2000 to establish a fund for needy borrowers and to adhere to a list of "best practices." The company says it holds itself "to the highest standards" and does not tolerate unethical or improper behavior by its employees.
The nation's largest sub-prime mortgage lender, based in Orange, has sought to burnish its image as it moves into prime, or mainstream, mortgage lending. It has increased its political profile, donating heavily to various campaigns, including in Sacramento. The privately held company, which may be considering a public stock offering, committed $75 million to have the Texas Rangers ballpark dubbed Ameriquest Field. And on Sunday it should gain even more recognition when it sponsors the halftime extravaganza at Super Bowl XXXIX.
"At Ameriquest," the company likes to say, "we never forget that our customers deserve respect, fairness and honesty."
Yet a far different picture emerges from public records, interviews and dozens of consumer lawsuits:
