Angelo Mozilo's Ethical Background

Angelo Mozilo’s family was poor and were unable to own their home, which was the driving force behind the creation of Countrywide. Indeed, when Countrywide was founded his primary goal was to make homeownership affordable for everyone, with a focus on minorities and low income families (O’Brien, 2010). However, after 2003, Countrywide’s products sole purpose was to increase market share and was even labeled as predatory by some because it resulted in massive foreclosures hurting the very people the company had originally sought to help (O’Brien, 2010).

Did Countrywide start out acting erratically and irresponsible? In 1969, Countrywide was founded by Angelo Mozilo and David Loeb with the dream of becoming the largest mortgage originator in the United States (Eastburn, 2010). By 1980, they had 40 offices in eight states with loan production that exceeded $1 billion (Eastburn, 2010). Later, in July of 2008, they sold to Bank of America for $4 billion (Ferrell, Fraedrich, & Ferrell, 2011). …show more content…
Clearly, if Countrywide had an ethics program, it was not being followed. What were the early signs of inappropriate conduct? The list is long and at times somewhat elusive, but included acts such as:
Employees were given incentives to take on riskier transactions;
Employees were told to offer subprime loans to those who qualified for a standard