Privacy Policy

Opes Advisors is dedicated to protecting the privacy of client information and to establishing trusting relationships based on respect for personal identity and information.

The law allows financial institutions to share information unless and until an individual specifically tells them not to. The law also allows a financial institution to share information without consent under joint marketing agreements. At Opes Advisors there is no need for our borrowers to opt out of shared marketing programs because we never sell or share their information with third party marketers, nor do we plan to do so in the future.

There are situations in the lending process that require the sharing of information but it is done to accommodate individual credit requests with full knowledge and consent of our borrowers, for instance:

• With companies involved in the loan process such as appraisers or title companies.
• With service providers that assist us with processes or functions.
• With investors to whom we sell the loan.
• As required to comply with laws regarding government reporting and other regulatory requirements.

HOW OPES ADVISORS PROTECTS INFORMATION

• OPES ADVISORS uses Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology supporting up to 128-bit encryption to prevent unauthorized parties from viewing any personal information transmitted to or from OPES ADVISORS.
• OPES ADVISORS limits access to personal information to only authorized staff and approved vendors.
• OPES ADVISORS requires all employees to take and pass a specially designed training course on privacy, and to sign a privacy pledge.

HOW OPES ADVISORS COLLECTS AND USES INFORMATION

OPES ADVISORS collects and uses a borrower's personal information to evaluate requests for mortgage credit. This information is typically gathered over the phone or from the Internet as a part of the OPES ADVISORS lead development and loan application processes. Certain personal information OPES ADVISORS collects about borrowers may be publicly available in government records, credit agency databases, telephone books, and/or the Internet. However, at OPES ADVISORS we treat all information as non-public and we maintain that information securely for only our use in helping customers.

RECORD RETENTION AND REPORTING POLICY

Federal and state agencies require that OPES ADVISORS provide aggregated demographic and loan funding information about our loan applicants. We maintain electronic and hardcopy loan application information for closed, cancelled and denied loans for a period of 3 years in accordance with federal and state laws.

SECURE WEBSITE

Eavesdropping and Impersonation are the primary security risks associated with transmitting data over the internet. OPES ADVISORS uses Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) to mitigate these risks. This equipment is standard with current versions of Internet Explorer, Netscape and AOL.

SSL server authentication allows the browser to confirm a server's identity. Using standard techniques of public-key cryptography, it checks that the server's certificate and public ID are valid and have been issued by a certificate authority (CA) listed in the browser's list of trusted CA's.

An SSL connection encrypts all information sent between a borrower's browser and the OPES ADVISORS server. This provides an extremely high degree of confidentiality. In addition, all data sent over an encrypted SSL connection is protected with a mechanism for detecting tampering - that is, for automatically determining whether the data has been altered in transit.

 

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