FLO CANNON - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Senior Vice President of Capital Markets
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Senior Vice President of Marketing
- Senior Vice President of Marketing for DAS Acquisition Company
Chelsea Vonder Haar is the Senior Vice President of Marketing for DAS Acquisition Company, LLC. She was born and raised in St. Louis, MO.
She has been in the mortgage industry for 9 years and with DAS Acquisition for 8 of them. She is passionate about setting DAS apart in the mortgage industry in their marketing initiatives and has helped grow their marketing to a print, social media, graphic design, and video marketing powerhouse that is truly unique to the mortgage industry. She loves managing and growing her incredible team to their full potential. There is nowhere she would rather be than DAS, a company that has believed in her and helped her grow since the very beginning of her career. Prior to her career in the mortgage industry, she worked in marketing and event management for a political campaign and a law firm after graduating with her Bachelor's Degree from Missouri State University in 2011. She is also a Certified Digital Marketing Professional with the Digital Marketing Institute and a Professional Certified Marketer in Digital Marketing with the American Marketing Association.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Vice President of Compliance
Job Titles:
- Chief Administrative Officer
- Member of the Executive Team
Dani Ploch is the Chief Administrative Officer for DAS Acquisition Company, LLC. She was born and raised in St. Charles, Missouri.
She has been in the industry and with USA for almost 20 years. Throughout the years, she has been fortunate enough to gain experience in every phase of the loan process, her specialty being Secondary Marketing.
She received her Bachelors of Science degree in Accounting and a Master of Business Administration with an emphasis in Leadership from Maryville University. USA Mortgage has fostered an environment that encourages employees to contribute ideas, develop and attain career growth plans and really feel involved in the success of the organization. This environment plus the reward of helping individuals become homeowners has kept her here for nearly 20 years and counting.
When she's not in the office you can find her hanging out with her husband and son at their farm in Northern Missouri or just hanging out at the house playing board games or watching movies.
Job Titles:
- CEO
- Chairman
- Member of the Executive Team
- Chairman and CEO of DAS Acquisition Company
Douglas A. Schukar is the Chairman and CEO of DAS Acquisition Company, LLC aka USA Mortgage. A veteran of the mortgage industry since 1989, Schukar started his career with Residential Financial Services, Inc. as a Mortgage Loan Originator (LO). After becoming the top LO there by 1991, Schukar followed the sale of the organization to its buyer, United Postal Savings and Loan (UPS) in 1993. UPS then sold to Mercantile Bank in 1994, who then sold the umbrella of companies to Firstar Bank in 1999.
Schukar maintained his goal of being the #1 Mortgage Loan Originator in St. Louis during each of those acquisitions and held that title for 7 years of the 1990s. Upon the acquisition by Firstar Bank, Schukar realized his career would journey to a national, entrepreneurial firm named LoanSurfer.com, who was headquartered in his hometown of St. Louis and did business in that metropolitan area as USA Mortgage. Schukar started there on February 14, 2000 as their VP of Sales for the St. Louis market.
LoanSurfer.com would go defunct by August 2000 in conjunction with the NASDAQ bubble bursting during the same time period. While that door may have closed quickly, a window opened for Schukar, who was soon faced with an opportunity to buy select, remaining assets of the defunct LoanSurfer.com.
On April 13, 2001, Schukar had opened USA Mortgage under his new corporate name, DAS Acquisition Company, LLC. The Company's growth is unparalleled and saw USA Mortgage catapult from a start-up to the largest Lender in the St. Louis metropolitan area by 2008 and the state of Missouri by 2014.
On December 31, 2017, Schukar converted his stock into a 100% employee-owned ESOP. The growth and headcount have continued at record pace as so many have realized the benefit of employee ownership. Closing $1.75 Billion in 2018, the Company saw volume exceed $2.4 Billion in 2019 and eclipsed $4.8 Billion in the COVID year of 2020.
A graduate of Vanderbilt University and the father of 2 children, Schukar is happily married and resides in St. Louis County. He maintains his loan officer license to keep his finger on the proverbial pulse of the Company's business processes. When not talking mortgages, Schukar enjoys his passion of scuba diving into any warm water his family's vacations might venture.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Vice President of Quality Control
Job Titles:
- Chief Financial Officer
- Member of the Executive Team
- Chief Financial Office for DAS Acquisition Company
Jason Wheatley is the Chief Financial Office for DAS Acquisition Company, LLC. He was born in San Antonio, TX and lived in Boise, ID before moving to St. Louis in 1990.
Jason joined USA Mortgage in November 2016 and been addicted to the industry ever since. He enjoys helping DAS employees learn more about the ESOP and watching their excitement grow with each passing year. Prior to joining he worked for PricewaterhouseCoopers and in the manufacturing/distribution industries. He graduated from Miami University in Oxford, OH in 1997 with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Accounting and completed his MBA in 2006 from Saint Louis University in St. Louis, MO.
Outside of work he likes to spend as much time as he can with his wife and two kids and enjoys learning about the world all over again through their eyes. When they aren't at the kid's games or activities they enjoy camping, hiking, traveling the US and working their way down the list of US National Parks. He has a hard time saying no to a good steak, single barrel bourbon or bad comedy & action movies.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Vice President of Closing
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Vice President of Human Resources
- Vice President of Human Resources for DAS Acquisition Company
Jennifer Bell is the Vice President of Human Resources for DAS Acquisition Company, LLC. She is a proud native St. Louisan, relocating back to her hometown after living in several different states and graduating from the University of Missouri-Columbia with a BSBA degree in Business. She has since earned HR certifications from both the Society of Human Resource Management (SHRM) and the HR Certification Institute (HRCI).
Jennifer has been with the company since its 2001 inception, leading our Human Resources team. Being a part of the DAS Acquisition family has been an exciting experience - it has been an honor for her to support the company's growth from a small, newly-formed company to the large, robust group of employee owners that DAS has today. She enjoys every minute of the entrepreneurial culture and spirit that makes DAS unique.
When she's not in the office, you can find her lost in the woods, hiking, rain or shine.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Vice President of Risk
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Vice President of Process Improvement
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Vice President of REALTOR Relations
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Vice President of Underwriting
Job Titles:
- Chief Operating Officer
- Member of the Executive Team
- President
- President and Chief Operating Officer of DAS Acquisition Company
Linda Pring is the President and Chief Operating Officer of DAS Acquisition Company, LLC and a member of the Board of Directors. She is responsible for the daily operations of the company, as well as legal, human resources and secondary markets. Ms. Pring started with the company since its inception in 2001.
Job Titles:
- Director of IT
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Director of IT for DAS Acquisition Company
Matt Dearth is the Director of IT for DAS Acquisition Company, LLC. He was raised in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Sunrise Beach, Missouri and St. Charles, Missouri.
He has worked with computers since grade school in the 1980's. After high school he joined the Army as a Missile Technician stationed in Redstone Arsenal, Alabama. After the military he managed a pizza restaurant until his Information Technology career started in the mid 1990's, placing him in the field for over 25 years.
During his career he self-studied to obtain the Microsoft Certification level of MCSE. He also attended University of Phoenix to achieve his bachelor's degree in Information Technology, all while raising two amazing daughters, both in High School National Honors Society with aspirations of a college degree; one in teaching and the other in graphic arts. He has been with DAS for 12 years; he's proud to say that he supported DAS growth from 175 employees to over 1000 employees. During that time, he has grown with DAS designing, procuring, implementing, and supporting all Information Technology Systems including Networks, Servers, Computers, Electronic Communication, Telephony, and Security.
When he's not facilitating Information Technology or raising his children, he likes to stay fit running and cycling with an occasional dumbbell challenge. He enjoys League Bowling and Coaching his daughter's High School Bowling Team, as well as supporting his other daughter's Competitive Figure Skating. If he has any free time after all that, you can find him carving back roads on a motorcycle, camping, or boating in Lake Ozarks.
Job Titles:
- Corporate Controller
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Corporate Controller for DAS Acquisition Company
Michael Gniadek is the Corporate Controller for DAS Acquisition Company, LLC and has served in this capacity since joining the Company in February 2019. As Corporate Controller, Mike oversees and directs the organization's Accounting Department. Day in and day out Mike is amazed by the fast paced nature of the Mortgage Industry and the never ending challenges USA Mortgage presents.
After graduating with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Accounting from the University of Dayton, he started his career with Arthur Andersen, LLP, one of the original Big Eight accounting firms and also spent significant time with Charter Communications, a leading telecommunications company and Zoltek Corporation, a materials company specializing in Commercial Carbon Fiber manufacturing. Throughout his work journey, Mike has managed to wear many hats within the Accounting world.
Mike is the proud father of two grown children both of which are now blazing their own careers in the Automotive and Occupational Therapy fields. When Mike is not playing inline roller hockey, he is trying to fulfill one of his life's aspirations to attend a baseball game at each Major League ballpark -23 down and 7 to go.
Job Titles:
- Executive Vice President
- Member of the Executive Team
Ron Mueller leads the company through technology with his responsibility for digitizing the mortgage industry to keep up with the ever-changing real estate organization. While he believes there will always be a need for human interaction, completely automating the process from end-to-end gives the consumer more options and better service. Sometimes mortgages can be very complicated, and not everyone's documents are digital, so he believes that trained enthusiastic team members still need to be available to help.
Ron has been with DAS for over 20 years and is passionate about helping people with their mortgage loans, developing new business, planning strategy, and building quality teams. He also was a driving force of DAS becoming an Employee-Owned Company in 2018. The Employee Stock Ownership Program (ESOP) is one of DAS's greatest employee benefits and is highly motivational since it encourages greater responsibility from the employees.
Ron's goal is to continue to grow the company and expand into other markets. Since becoming Executive Vice President, he has already doubled the size of the company and has expanded the business into almost all 50 states. Ron enjoys helping team members flourish and develop into leaders who understand how to align their goals to corporate objectives that contribute to the business's longevity. He believes that sitting down with people and developing a plan with them for their career is essential. He has successfully promoted several Branch and Regional Managers into positions where they can manage, originate loans, and take their careers to the next level. He believes strongly that nurturing relationships within the community, the business, and with clients is the best way to ensure long-term success.
Ron is a graduate of the University of Missouri in Columbia and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Interdisciplinary Studies. He resides in St. Louis City, and he and his wife, Jessie, have two young boys. Ron is an avid runner, enjoys skiing, and spends a lot of his time outdoors with his family and coaching his son's soccer teams.
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Director of Onboarding
Job Titles:
- Member of the Leadership Team
- Senior Vice President of Mortgage Technology