Hayes Barnard
President
Hayes founded Paramount Equity with a passion to build great businesses with selfless people who are committed to saving their neighbors money. The first division of the company, Paramount Equity Mortgage, was founded in 2003 and quickly grew to over 300 employees serving customers in six states. To date, PEM has completed over $8 billion in loans making it one of the most successful mortgage banking and sales operations in the country. In 2006, Hayes launched Paramount Equity Insurance Services providing families with cost-effective home, auto, and life insurance policies. Paramount Energy Solutions was created in 2009 to help customers immediately reduce their energy bills, protect them from rising electricity costs, and preserve the environment by adopting renewable energy technologies.
Along the way, Hayes and Paramount Equity have both received accolades from the communities they serve. Hayes has been the recipient of the Roseville Chamber's "Entrepreneur of the Year Award", the Oregon Association of Broadcaster's "Advertiser of the Year Award", and was honored in the National Mortgage Professional Magazine's "40 Under 40" list. The company was also recognized as a "New California 100 Innovative Business" by Golden Capital Network and Hamilton Lane and was awarded first place for all large companies at the Sacramento Business Journal's "A+ Employers" awards. Hayes is a current active member of the Sacramento Chapter of Entrepreneurs Organization and serves as the chair for the annual Sacramento Liquidity Event. He also serves on the board for the Positive Coaching Alliance.
Hayes graduated from the University of Missouri with a BA in Business Management and Marketing. He established his career in the Silicon Valley at Hitachi Data Systems before moving on to positions with Oracle Corporation. From 1995-2003, he worked in a variety of sales, management, and marketing capacities where he was responsible for Oracle's most strategic global accounts.
Jason Walker
Vice President of Mortgage Banking
Jason is Paramount Equity's primary evaluator of mortgage business risk. His prudent decision-making has enabled the company to continue to thrive by avoiding many of the pitfalls that other mortgage companies have encountered over the last couple of years. Jason's focus on insuring that each customer receives the proper loan for their situation has been an invaluable asset to the company and its clients. He is also responsible for the secondary marketing of mortgage loans to help insure low rates and fees for the company's customers.
Jason graduated from the University of Missouri with a BA in Finance and Real Estate. He established a career in the mortgage and banking industry starting in loan origination and later working in sales and branch operations management roles. After eight years of working for mortgage companies in the mid-West, Jason moved to Sacramento to launch Paramount Equity Mortgage to provide an unprecedented level of professionalism and service he believed that customers deserved.
Michele Magee
Executive Vice President of Operations
Michele joined the Paramount Equity team in 2005 as the company's VP of Marketing where she built the company's in-house advertising agency. In addition to buying radio advertising in as many as 17 cities with nearly 185 radio stations at a given time, she and her team have established the company as a very successful new media advertiser utilizing search, content and lead generation strategies. The team has also produced TV campaigns, automated marketing systems, and various branding packages for Paramount Equity's new entities. She was responsible for implementing database technologies and building Paramount Equity's in-house telemarketing department, handles all public relations initiatives, and event management projects.
In 2006 and 2007, Michele added direct responsibility for the Human Resources, Asset Management, Business System/IT, Administrative Service, Recruitment, and Legal departments. In 2008, she launched the Home First sales divisions which serve the changing needs of the company's past customers.
Previous to joining the Paramount Equity team, Michele worked in radio sales and station management capacities for EZ Communications, American Radio Systems, and Infinity Broadcasting over a 15-year period. She's owned two companies including a chain of five retail franchise locations and a magazine publishing company. Michele graduated from the University of the Pacific with a BS in Business Administration and Marketing.
Bill Johnson
Vice President of Finance
Bill graduated from Northeastern University with a BA in Accounting. He started his career in the real estate development business and has been a VP of Finance for the past 15 years in the mortgage banking arena.
His decision in joining Paramount Equity was based on the company's vision to have a positive impact on the lives of its customers and its communities. The finance department's goal is to provide positive support to ensure that every transaction runs smoothly.
Elaine Eaton
Vice President of Mortgage Operations
Elaine joins the executive management team of Paramount Equity Mortgage as Vice President of Mortgage Operations. With over 26 years in the mortgage industry her experience ranges from Sales to Operations in both forward lending and reverse mortgages. Most recently and for nearly eight years she held senior management positions at the nation's largest lender and servicer of reverse mortgages with product emphasis on FHA.
While employed with Financial Freedom Senior Funding Corporation, a subsidiary of IndyMac Bank; as First Vice President and Regional Operations Manager, Elaine proved to be a platform builder and process improver bringing people together with technology through education and training. She launched and led continuous process improvement projects during periods of exponential growth, resulting in her operations center achieving lower turn times, reduced cost to produce, excellent metric and measurement for greater productivity and fewer audit exceptions. All this was achieved while providing and cultivating an outstanding customer experience. Most recent areas of responsibility included file intake, processing, underwriting, closing, funding and post closing activities for loans from all sales channels including retail, wholesale, affinity and closed loan purchase transactions. Elaine also led the Retail Sales Team for the West Coast at the onset of her service with Financial Freedom.
While employed with Wells Fargo (Formerly Norwest Mortgage and Directors Mortgage) Elaine was responsible for the management of wholesale loan production originators and related activities for loan procurement and managed operations centers in both Orange County and Sacramento California. She was awarded for production and profitability.
Elaine is a recognized expert and has been a frequent speaker on reverse mortgage underwriting and operations issues at industry conferences.
Eric Meadows
Vice President of Risk Management
Eric joined the team in 2009. Throughout his extensive experience in the mortgage industry with American Equity Mortgage, Eric held various roles including VP of Operations, COO, and General Counsel. He now serves as Paramount Equity's General Counsel and VP of Risk Management, and lends his expertise to policies and practices while promoting Paramount's vision.
Eric received his BA from Lake Forest College (Illinois), went on to achieve his JD cum laude from California Western School of Law, and pursued additional tax law studies at Georgetown University. Although Eric calls Chicago home, he's also lived in Atlanta, Detroit, New Mexico, San Diego, Washington, DC, and New Zealand. He and his wife Teresa, a New Zealand native, have a 7-year old son.
Matt Hurych
Vice President of Sales
Matt is a long time member of the Paramount team. Prior to becoming VP of Sales, he paved the way for expansion by opening the first sales branch in Portland, Oregon. After establishing that market, he was promoted to a Regional Sales Manager position overseeing the northwest territory. He has played a large part in recruitment, compliance, innovation of business systems, business development, training, and mentoring future leaders for the company.
Matt is currently responsible for all strategic sales activity for PEM including cross-selling for all products under the Paramount Equity umbrella. In this role he works directly with the executive management team to identify new opportunities to continuously improve existing sales numbers and strategies.
Matt established a career in the mortgage industry immediately after attending N.E. Missouri State University. He has established himself as a veteran of the industry after 12 years of devotion. He managed several banking branches in the mid-west before deciding to join PEM and has played a critical role in the company's success.
