Mortgage Bankers Association nominates its 2024 vice chair

Christine Chandler, an executive with commercial real estate finance provider M&T Realty Capital, has been nominated by the Mortgage Bankers Association to be its vice chair for 2024.

As a result, she will be in line to move up to the organization's chair for its 2026 membership year.

Chandler is the executive vice president, chief credit officer and chief operating officer with M&T Realty Capital, a Baltimore-based unit of M&T Bank. She is responsible for making credit decisions for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Federal Housing Administration multifamily and healthcare transactions as well as managing the company's operations and its Asset Management Group and Transformation team.

She has been with M&T since 1991 and took on her current position in 2018.

Chandler is also the chair of the MBA's Commercial Real Estate/Multifamily Finance Board of Governors and was appointed to the group's DEI Committee in 2022 and its Audit Committee in 2021.

"Christine is a passionate and influential leader in real estate finance and is a terrific choice to lead MBA and its members through the challenges and opportunities our industry faces," said Matt Rocco, the current MBA chairman and president of Colliers Mortgage, in a press release. "She is one of MBA's most active members and is a strong advocate of ensuring sustainable homeownership and rental housing opportunities in communities nationwide."

The current chair-elect is Mark Jones, the CEO of Amerifirst Home Mortgage, which was acquired in December by Union Home Mortgage; that company is headed up by Bill Cosgrove, who is a past MBA chair.

Laura Escobar, the president of Lennar Mortgage is the MBA's vice chair this year. Both Escobar and Chandler will join the growing number of women who have held the top slot at MBA. The organization did not have a woman chair until 2005, when Regina Lowrie, who suddenly passed away on Jan. 1, moved into the role.