Mortgage Mergers Sustain

Columbia-based South Carolina Bank and Trust N.A. said Monday it has agreed to purchase the assets of Devine Mortgage LLC, a lender started in Columbia, S.C., in 2003.

The Devine Mortgage office will reportedly become a South Carolina Bank loan production office and provide residential mortgages, as well as consumer and commercial lending services.

In Vancouver, Wash., Riverview Bancorp announced that it completed acquiring American Pacific Bank, which has merged with and into Riverview Community Bank.

“The acquisition represents Riverview’s entry into the attractive Portland market area and highlights our commitment to expand into selective new, high-growth banking markets around the Portland metropolitan area,” said Riverview Chairman and CEO Pat Sheaffer in the prepared statement.

The parent of Riverview Mortgage indicated in the announcement that the three branches of Portland, Ore.-based American Pacific and its employees started operating under the Riverview banner as of last week.

In St. Louis, Mo., TALX Corp. announced it acquired substantially all the assets of Glick & Glick Consultants LLC for $5 million in cash.

Glick, of the Dallas area, specializes in obtaining hiring tax credits and other federal, state and local tax credits and incentives for its clients, according to the announcement.

Glick reportedly fits naturally with TALX existing tax and incentive services offerings, and provides additional clients that can benefit from other TALX services, such as its two key employment-related services — automated employment and income verification services via The Work Number and unemployment cost management services.

TALX says thousands of organizations ranging from government agencies to major mortgage lenders use its employment and income verification service.

Lynwood, Wash.-based Phoenix Savings Bank recently announced its name change to Pacific Crest Savings Bank and its first expansion outside of Washington with a mortgage lending unit in Stateline, Nev.

While the original name was chosen to represent its predecessor’s (Phoenix Mortgage Co.) rising from the ashes of an earlier mortgage company, the name change was executed to eliminate confusion that it was a bank based in Arizona, according to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

The bank says it has closed over $7 billion in home loans since its creation in 1984 as Phoenix Mortgage, which converted to a savings bank in 1998.

The Pacific Crest Mortgage lending center was launched Sunday in the Lake Tahoe market of Nevada. The unit provides an expanded selection of in-house products and local underwriting, which “will allow the staff to expedite the approval and funding process, delivering an increased level of service to real estate professionals and homebuyers in the Tahoe area,” the bank reported.

The new mortgage unit expands the Washington-based lineup of three Pacific Crest full service offices and two construction lending offices.