Sable Otey has spent most of her adult life clearing hurdles -- usually the type that are lined up single file on a running track -- but there have been a few that life has dropped in her way. When the world is your stage, you want to be at your best when Olympic gold is hanging in the balance.
She's challenged herself to earn a spot on the United States bobsled team that competed in the Winter Olympics in South Korea. In some ways, it's a major transition from track and field, her sport of choice in high school, college and one year beyond, but in other ways, her role on the bobsled team is very similar. Either way, Otey is convinced she had the athleticism, work ethic and support and made her latest dream reality.
After her pregnancy ended hopes of participating in the 2012 Olympic track and field trials, Otey figured she'd transition into life as a wife, mother and schoolteacher in her hometown of Memphis, Tenn., but then a relative suggested she give bobsledding a try. After all, the rear member of the bobsled team, known as the brakeman, often has track and field experience since a strong push with good speed is needed at the start. There are two- and four-man teams, and Otey is on the two-man team.
Otey had never even considered the sport, however. She didn't care much for cold weather and wasn't a fan of rollercoasters, but that just elevated the challenge. Having a track and field background certainly didn't hurt.
"Having that technical background in track and field. ... that has played a major role," she said. "You find yourself having to use some of those same techniques while trying to push the sled."
Otey grew up in the Memphis neighborhood of Binghampton, one of two children to Tamara Otey, a single mother who's now an Assistant Professor at Goldfarb School of Nursing at Barnes-Jewish College in St. Louis. Otey ran track at Memphis East High School and, shortly after graduating, married her high school sweetheart, Reuben, who had joined the Navy.

Reuben was transferred west to San Diego, where Otey continued competing in track and field, first at Mesa Community College in 2007, then at Cal State San Marcos in 2008, where she became an NAIA All-American while specializing in the seven-event heptathlon.
Otey was so good she earned a partial scholarship to George Mason University in Virginia, where she won a Colonial Athletic Association title in the heptathlon in 2010, thanks to wins in the 400 meters, 800 and 100 hurdles.
Her track and field career continued to spike even after graduation. Running unattached in 2011 at the nationally renown Mt. SAC Relays in Walnut, Calif., she posted a lifetime-best score in the heptathlon of 4,953 points, aided by a personal-best wind-legal time of 14.08 seconds in the 100 hurdles (she ran a wind-aided time of 13.82 the following month at the Occidental Invitational in Eagle Rock).
Otey was well on her way to earning a spot in the Summer Olympic trials the following year, but then learned she was pregnant and was forced to curtail her training.
Otey couldn't bear to watch the 2012 Olympics in London, instead turning her attention to training other athletes, as well as furthering her education by earning a master's degree in education at National University in 2013.
Otey and her husband also headed back to Memphis with their baby boy, Amar'e, where she landed a job as a health and physical education teacher at a local elementary school. Otey figured that would be her life moving forward, but then the chance to be a bobsledder reinvigorated her Olympic hopes.

Olympic Bobsled Training

Then there's the soothing ice baths a couple times a week.
"After you do all that, all the pounding and things like that, you need to make sure that you're doing recovery," she said. Dr. Patrick Kolwaite, owner and practitioner of two The Joint Chiropractic locations in Memphis (Wolfchase and Collierville), has also become an important part of Otey's recovery.
"I was going there a couple times a week to get adjusted, and that really helps," Otey said. "When my tailbone gets kicked out, or anything gets out of whack, I can feel it. When you're used to getting good therapy, you can feel when something's out of place."
Fortunately for Otey, there’s not a lot that’s out of place.
Flexibility is a key to remaining injury-free, and performing to, literally, the gold standard.
And that would be bad when you’re going for gold.
Currently she and her husband Reuben Otey are the owners and operators of the Triple M Agency located in Cordova Tenn where they help families, especially African-American families to learn about wealth building and entrepreneurial financial fitness tools. Both are Life Insurance entrepreneurs helping both their community and Memphis become more fiscally secure.

Nicolas Manetta-“Those who don’t think outside the box are easily contained.”

“We have reached a tipping point,” real estate market experts are saying.   They point out that more homes are being listed for sale, and the prices are still rising, but not at the double-digit frenzy we have seen over the last year.

Homebuyers are stepping back into action and making offers on homes now that there may be only five competing offers on the house they want instead of twenty-five offers.

Buyers want to lock in a fixed mortgage rate in high two’s or three’s to give themselves an affordable house payment and a design on building their personal wealth.  

Home sellers sitting on the fence are now staking the “For Sale” sign out in the yard.     While home prices are high and demand is red hot, sellers want to realize the highest profit and not regret later that they did not sell high when they had the chance. 

Home prices and borrowing costs that continue to climb crimps affordability on homes for sale.  Homebuyers who are committed to get the life they want have to think outside the box.  If the home that fits their design is too high for their budget, they look for a home that they can convert to their desired design.   

Some homebuyers find a lower-priced fixer-upper home. We put together the special loan programs it requires to finance the purchase and the fix-ups.  

Others find homes that have not been refurbished in 30 years. If that house is surrounded by homes that have been remodeled and updated, then the chances are good they can buy it at a lower price and remodel gradually over time to get the home looking like they like it.

Then there are people like Charlie and his wife who were budget-conscious.  Charlie was in his 30’s with a wife and a young child and another baby on the way.  “The house we are in is a little cramped now, but when the baby is born, this house won’t work for us at all.”  He talked about a neighborhood where he and his wife were looking at houses.  

When I asked him questions about the price ranges of the homes in the neighborhood he was describing, his voice sort of trailed off. He didn’t finish his sentence. Then, without any warning, he just blurted out, “I don’t really want to buy an existing home anywhere.  What I really  want to do is build the house the way we want to live in it.”

When he asked which financing program would be best for him, my answer was the one he already knew to be true before he ever asked. The real question was, “Where will you be happiest—in an already built home or the new construction home you design yourself?”

So many times, the best deal ever is the one where you follow your heart and figure out for yourself how to make it work.   Charlie and I started working on the money down and the payments per month if a builder built the house he wanted out in the country.  Unfortunately, the home they wanted was just too pricey for their current budget. 

After looking at a few ideas, he finally decided that he could afford to build the house they wanted if he didn’t finish the attic and left the bonus room unfinished.  Charlie and his wife could finish that part later 

“With small children, I wouldn’t want them trying to navigate stairs anyway. Then, when the children are a little older, and I have a little more saved back, we can finish out the upstairs, and it will be like having a brand new house.” He planned to consult with a realtor who knew the values in the area. He was going to get with a builder and then come back to me with some prices and terms we could compare on putting together his mortgage terms. 

As real estate and financing professionals, we have to open up the box and encourage customers to find ways to get the home they want with the financing they can afford. To help remember the most clever ideas, consider keeping a digital notebook of methods former clients and other pros have used to break through affordability barriers.  

Jo Garner, Mortgage Loan Officer  NMLS#757309 Sierra Pacific Mortgage Cordova, TN NMLS #1788 (an equal housing lender.)  Host of iHeart radio show Real Estate Mortgage Shoppe. Author of “Choosing the Best Mortgage-The Quickest Way to the Life You Want” available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and on www.JoGarner.com 

Now is an important time in our industry to pay attention to the numbers, the charts, and especially the political rhetoric on all sides. I don’t remember a series of potential market movers and known events all happening in the next week, but any or all of these could dramatically move the markets.

First, lets look at where we are to see where the mortgage markets sit as of 6am 10-7-21 when I am writing this: UMBS 30yr 2.5% is 103.05 – 10yr T is 1.52. In the past year the High was 105.63 on 1/4/21 and a low of 102.20 on 3/19/21 and the 10yr T was 1.71 on 3/31/21 and .709 on 10/14/20 Just a point of reference and charts you can have available to share with your clients. We also saw refinances drop 10% week over week and down 16% year over year with rates only being about .125% higher this year. Market certainly volatile and the trend is for rates to go higher. Case-Schiller nails home values up over 19% year over year.

Events that can move the markets. 

• Today 10-7-21 initial jobless claims
• Friday 10-8-21 September 2021 Jobs Report
• Next week – 10-13-21 – CPI report & 10-14-21 PPI

Ongoing movers can include:

• New conforming loan limits for 1-1-22 $625,000
• Debt Ceiling
• Is $3.5 TRILLION DOLLARS really ZERO?
• Will “Infrastructure” Bill ever get passed?
• Supply chain getting better or worse?
• Southern Boarder/COVID/Vaccines/Boosters/CRT/FBI targeting parents…

There is a lot to talk about. Questions or comments: Mike@IMTcoaching