Karen Carpenter

Director of Mortgage Investigations and Verification Service

With nearly 30 years of experience in the mortgage industry – including the last 14 years advancing her specialization and national credentials in setting very high investigatory standards for the many operational processes that underlie a successful mortgage fraud investigation, Karen Carpenter is now helping Hillard Heintze clients meet their strategic mortgage investigations and verification objectives.

Prior to joining Hillard Heintze, Carpenter served as the Director of Investigations for the mortgage insurance division of Genworth Financial, a leading Fortune 500 global financial security company with more than $100 billion in assets, 6,000 employees, and 15 million customers worldwide.
During her tenure at Genworth Financial, Carpenter was responsible for the review and assessment of thousands of loans, resulting in the mitigation of millions of dollars. She also participated in both arbitration and litigation cases for Genworth and led numerous projects to uncover mortgage fraud rings throughout the country. Driving her success in this capacity was her extensive understanding of the critical processes supporting areas such as underwriting, default servicing, recovery and deficiencies, and claims – and how the “paper trail” spun off by these processes should be examined to uncover legally-enforceable evidence of fraud.

As Genworth rapidly grew its global footprint, Carpenter was tasked with expanding the company’s investigative operations in Australia as well as with providing critical support to other international divisions including those in the U.K. and Mexico. As a thought leader and highly experienced customer-centric operations manager, Carpenter also served as a member of the Genworth Financial Fraud Council – a governance body responsible for sharing best practices, vendor selection, fraud detection tools and fraud scheme information across all of Genworth’s businesses.

Chief among the many skills that distinguished Carpenter’s career was her effective collaboration with Genworth’s front-end operations including its risk, legal and product development departments as well as its sales organization. In fact, in 2008, Carpenter earned the coveted Sales MVP Award.

One of Genworth’s most valued employees, Carpenter has earned numerous awards for both her professional achievements as well as her volunteer efforts. Most recently, Carpenter was awarded Genworth’s 2008 “Changing the World Award” recognizing her contributions to the Center For Volunteer Caregiving (CVC), Paw Prints Animal Rescue, Duke Children’s Hospital and the Alzheimer’s Association. She also received the 2008 CVC Caregiver Award for her outstanding efforts.

A graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Carpenter has a Bachelor of Science degree in Business. She also received her Greenbelt certification in the Six Sigma program at GE.