Paralegal

The Role

We are seeking a self-starting, entrepreneurial Paralegal (5+ years of experience) to join our growing Legal team. This is a unique opportunity to work directly with the General Counsel and a small, high-impact legal/compliance team in a role that blends transactional support, regulatory compliance, legal operations, and cross-functional process building.

Ascent operates with a nationwide footprint and provides short-term, real estate secured business-purpose loans to best-in-class developers. This role is ideal for someone who enjoys being close to the business, partnering with operations and leadership teams, and helping build scalable processes while maintaining strong attention to detail and sound judgment.

You will work collaboratively with internal stakeholders, outside counsel, and third-party partners/vendors to help execute, track, and improve legal and compliance processes.

This role is suited for someone not afraid to roll up their sleeves and dive into complex and nuanced issues and deals that come part and parcel with a growing company.  You will collaborate with internal stakeholders, outside counsel, and third-party partners/vendors to help execute, track, and improve legal and compliance processes.  Working day-to-day with the General Counsel and legal team, you will have a proactive and influential role in shaping the company’s trajectory – it is an exciting space and this role will be exciting for someone who loves to create and loves the thrill of new and novel deals.  It also necessitates an initiative-taking and risk-oriented individual who has experience with a growing company, as the compliance needs will adapt as the company continues to grow. 

The Work 

Compliance & Licensing & L/D Support

• Support the General Counsel and business stakeholders in maintaining and strengthening Ascent’s compliance program.
• Own the end-to-end process regarding company licensing maintenance, renewals, and documentation across jurisdictions.
• Support regulatory reporting processes (e.g., HMDA, call reports, licensing reports), including gathering information, tracking deadlines, and maintaining submission records.
• Help monitor regulatory developments and support implementation efforts across the organization.
• Take a leadership role in shaping a compliance education program with compliance education initiatives, including training and tracking training completion and maintaining documentation, as well as working with Ascents compliance training vendor.
• Support analysis of BSA/AML/KYC inquiries and questions.

Litigation Support

• Support matter tracking and legal operations reporting (e.g., deadlines, statuses, intake logs).
• Take a leadership role in supporting litigation tracking and information requests as needed, including coordination with outside counsel, tracking deadlines and document requests, and supporting subpoena or inquiry responses.
• Assist with legal holds and eDiscovery coordination, including documentation of preservation steps and collaborating with vendors/outside counsel as needed.

HR / People Operations Support 

• Familiarity with onboarding/offboarding coordination and related documentation.
• Support maintenance of confidential employee documentation and records.
• Help track completion of required training and policy acknowledgements.
• Provide support in the drafting of HR policies and procedures.

Your Skills and Experience

• Paralegal Certificate required.
• Strong understanding of real estate finance fundamentals.
• 5+ years of paralegal experience, ideally in real estate finance, lending, financial services, law firm, lender, bank, debt fund, or similar environment.
• Strong organizational and project-tracking skills; ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.
• Comfortable working cross-functionally with operations, leadership, outside counsel, and third-party vendors.
• Exposure to litigation support, legal holds, or eDiscovery coordination.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills.
• High integrity, discretion, and sound judgment.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience supporting compliance/licensing in a lending or regulated environment.
• Familiarity with legal operations workflows and process improvement.
• Construction lending or special assets exposure is a plus.
• Basic familiarity with HR processes and documentation (onboarding/offboarding, recordkeeping, policy acknowledgements) and willingness to support as needed.

The Pay

Salary range is $100,000-$125,000 per year with a discretionary bonus of up to 15% per year

The Work Environment

• Flexible.  The team is based in Encino, CA but we are open to other geographies! For candidates outside of Southern California, occasional travel to Headquarters will be required.

• Full-time, 40 hours per week; must be available for occasional overtime.

• Some nights and weekends required.