The “friend” thing is how I wound up in contact with a little bank in Georgia. We didn’t get a “deal” … except that they were amazingly on top of things despite the geography and time difference. My agent had some unkind words for some of the services used in this deal (escrow guys overcharged and were kind of lame, appraiser goofed up, etc.), but he said the lender was “as good as it gets” service-wise. I agree, they were terrific. (Plug: “They” means David Turner at Westside Bank in Hiram, Georgia. He’s done a couple of short sales in California and might welcome more biz from the Land of Tofu.)
The bank was actually just a broker for this loan, so they didn’t fund anything directly.
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I know you probably don’t care, but… your WestSide Bank in Hiram, Georgia looks a magnitude worse than SDNB. I’ll be shocked if it survives. 48% of its loans are in construction, almost 10% of the loan portfolio is past due, they lost almost $5 million last year. Horrific deposit base. It’s a total disaster. And things are getting worse. Again, I know you don’t care, but I would expect to see this one seized in the not-too-distant future. Among the worst looking balance sheets I’ve ever seen. Which in a way is not surprising as they have no business doing ANYTHING whatsoever outside of Georgia, much less in California.
