CRENSHAW : New Center Offers Easier Home Loans

To help make home loans more accessible to inner-city residents, First Interstate Bank has opened a Community Home Loan Center in the Crenshaw district.

The center, at 3310 W. Slauson Ave. in the Crenshaw Towne Shopping Center, offers first-time home buyers financial counseling, special incentives and a more relaxed atmosphere than traditional banks, First Interstate spokesman Rich Wyler said.

Though the Crenshaw location is the fourth community center the bank has opened in California, it is the first in Southern California. Wyler said the new center will help the bank fulfill a commitment made in 1993 to make $30 million in loans in central Los Angeles.

Rod Gaines, First Interstate’s national manager of community mortgage programs, said the primary goal of the center is to persuade clients that a home purchase is within their reach.

“We’re trying to educate people about the possibilities that exist for first-time buyers,” said Gaines, who is also president of Los Angeles Urban Bankers, an independent group that seeks to increase bank services for inner-city residents.

Thanks to a partnership between First Interstate and the Federal National Mortgage Assn., the loan center is able to offer special mortgage plans: out-of-pocket down payments as low as 3%, interest-only payment plans and 5% down payments for any qualified borrower, regardless of income level, who is purchasing a home in a low-income or predominantly minority neighborhood.

Each loan program allows eligible customers to pay closing costs with funds borrowed from family members, a departure from the typical mortgage requirement that all money be the borrower’s own, Gaines said. Loan documentation, underwriting and processing fees will be reduced by 50%.

It is the second home loan center to open in the Crenshaw district in the last year. The Operation Hope Vision Center in Leimert Park opened last year.

Like the Vision Center, the Community Home Loan Center offers counseling for clients who don’t qualify immediately.

Information: (213) 290-7600.