Despite the coronavirus pandemic, the company holiday bonus season is still happening in 2020.
Michigan-based United Wholesale Mortgage (UWM) is looking to bring some hope and a little extra reward to their employees’ lives in the form of $25 million in cumulative bonuses.
“Obviously, it's been a troubling year in the markets of America, across the country,” Mat Ishbia, president and CEO of UWM, said recently on Yahoo Finance Live (video above). “And at a mortgage company, we feel it's really our obligation to make an impact by helping more consumers.”
With more than 14.4 million cases and over 280,000 deaths just within the U.S. according to the CDC, not to mention over seven million jobs lost, the coronavirus pandemic has had a devastating effect across the country.
New cars, free cruise, bills paid for a year
Although many companies suffered a result of the pandemic, UWM had another record-breaking year, as it now plans to go public in the largest SPAC deal in history.
As the current no. 1 wholesale lender and largest purchase mortgage lender in America, UWM is known not only for its yearly monster growth but its insane holiday bonuses and parties as well.
Last year during the company’s holiday party, Ishbia gifted 13 lucky employees new Cadillacs and 30 employees a cruise to the Bahamas with the opportunity to bring a guest along.
This year, he managed to top that during the company’s virtual holiday party.
In a statement to Yahoo Finance, UWM said they will pay a total of “$25 million in bonuses cumulatively to team members for reaching the company’s 3-year goals which were set in 2017.”
In addition to that, “all team members will receive a minimum of $1,000 in company stock based on their tenure for a total of $35 million in team-member owned shares of UWM which will list as UWMC at NYSE when the company goes public.”
The gifts didn’t stop there. UWM also announced that “instead of its annual all-expenses-paid cruise trip, 50 team members won an all-expenses-paid trip for two to Fontainebleau all-inclusive resort in Miami, Florida.”
“We're all going together,” Ishbia said. “It's not just go when you want. We all go the same weekend.”
Ishbia explained that not all of his elaborate gifts are given at random. Some prizes are awarded to team members who are recognized for their hard work with raffle tickets that they can use to cash into big mystery ticket items come time for the holiday party.
“This was not just a random raffle — people [in the company] earn raffle tickets throughout the year by doing a great job,” he said.