Ruoff Mortgage Lays Off Nearly 5% Of Staff

Ruoff Mortgage Co. and its affiliated companies, based in Fort Wayne, Ind., reduced the size of its workforce earlier this week by approximately 4.6%, according to a company statement released Sept. 16.

“We are saddened that economic conditions precipitated the need to adjust our team to a size more appropriate for the current environment,” said Marc Music, Ruoff Mortgage president & CEO. “We are grateful for the contributions that the affected team members made during their tenure. The overall economy is at full employment with many job openings, which will hopefully minimize the impact.”

Ruoff said the contraction has been directly related to the Federal Reserve’s moves to get inflation under control. The Fed has increased its federal funds rate four times this year.

Interest rates for a conventional residential 30-year mortgage loan sat at 6.3% nationally earlier this week. Last year at this time, rates were 2.86%. As rates have risen, the demand for refinance transactions has fallen more than 80% from the same time last year.

Ruoff's announcement did not directly disclose how many employees were affected by the downsizing. In an interview with Business Weekly, however, Music stated that, "There were 43 affected employees locally, and local folks made up a very significant portion of those affected."