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Front Page » Communities » New Hialeah bank halfway to opening funding goal

New Hialeah bank halfway to opening funding goal

Written by on March 15, 2022
  • www.miamitodayepaper.com
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New Hialeah bank halfway to opening funding goal

A new bank in Hialeah is preparing to open by September. OUR Community Bank is now raising the needed capital, Executive Chairman Emilio Santandreu told Miami Today.

The bank has already received approval from the Office of Financial Regulation to become a state-chartered bank. It is to have an initial capital of $18 million and has already raised over half of that.

“I think that in the course of the month of March we will possibly have [the remaining amount] ready,” Mr. Santandreu said.

When the bank opens, it will be the first new state-chartered bank in Miami-Dade County in at least five years, Jeremy W. Smith, director of the state’s Division of Financial Institutions, told Miami Today in January.

OUR Community Bank directors includes as Director-President and CEO Lyan Fernandez, who was chief operating officer and risk officer of the former TotalBank, based in Miami-Dade.

Other directors are Rafael Saldaña, with 30-plus years in executive management positions in banking, commercial and consumer lending, and other areas; Javier Soto, currently CEO of the Denver Foundation and former Miami Foundation CEO; and other financial and legal experts with a background in the Miami-Dade County market, Mr. Santandreu said.

The group had already been operating in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties for almost 15 years as OUR MicroLending LLC, a company for micro-lending.

“During the pandemic we realized there was a vacuum in the market for lending to small businesses, between $50,000 and $300,000, and that is why we decided to ask for the charter, which was well received by the Florida authorities,” Mr. Santandreu said.

Within its first year, OUR Community Bank aims to make 250 to 300 loans, he said. That is around $35 million in lending during the first year, followed by $80 million in the second and around $140 million in the third year of operations.

“We are also going to have deposit customers and we will provide all comprehensive banking services, including [services for] multi-family businesses,” Mr. Santandreu said.

The community bank, to be headquartered in Hialeah, will by definition be a minority depository institution, as most of the directors are minorities and the community the institution serves is predominantly minority. The board has members from Cuba, Venezuela, Puerto Rico, and other places abroad.

The bank plans a strategy of taking to the streets to build business. “We are going to be looking for our clients in the streets and not be sitting and waiting for the businesses to come to the bank,” Mr. Santandreu said.

“We chose the headquarters in Hialeah because the area clearly represents the focus of the bank. Hialeah is full of small businesses and immigrants, and we want to serve that market,” he added.

The group, he said, has four pillars for operations.

First, they aim to work on the principle of relationship banking, establishing close relationships with customers.

Second, the community bank plans to use up-to-date technology to provide efficient service.

Third, OUR Community plans to inculcate a culture of compliance within its employees so that compliance is not a requirement imposed by the government but woven into the culture of the company.

Fourth, he said, the bank aims to hire the best talent to assist the public, persons with extensive backgrounds in banking but who also know the area.
OUR Community Bank first filed to be a state-chartered bank with the Florida Office of Financial Regulation on Oct. 9, 2019, and subsequently submitted a substantially revised application on May 20, 2020, a document from the state office says. The application was deemed complete on Jan. 22, 2021.

“The office discovered no information to preclude the individuals who have been investigated from serving in their proposed capacities, as they meet the qualification requirements,” says the document signed by state Commissioner of Financial Regulation Russell C. Weigel III.

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