Premier Mortgage Funding - Net Branch Lender, Mortgage Banker
2007-07-11
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As ml-premium subscribers already know, Premier, the Clearwater, FL-based lender (with reportedly 500-600 branches) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the middle district of Florida on July 3rd. The notice of filing, accessed from the Federal court records system, follows:
United States Bankruptcy Court
Middle District of FloridaNotice of Bankruptcy Case Filing
A bankruptcy case concerning the debtor(s) listed below was filed under Chapter 11 of the United States Bankruptcy Code, entered on 07/03/2007 at 08:56 AM and filed on 07/03/2007 at 08:56 AM.
Premier Mortgage Funding, Inc.
3001 Executive Dr., Ste. 330
Clearwater, FL 33762
Tax id: 30-0030026The case was filed by the debtor's attorney:
Buddy D. Ford
115 N. MacDill Avenue
Tampa, FL 33609
813-877-4669The case was assigned case number 8:07-bk-05713-CPM to Judge Catherine Peek McEwen.
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If you would like to view the bankruptcy petition and other documents filed by the debtor, they are available at our Internet home page https://ecf.flmb.uscourts.gov or at the Clerk's Office, Sam M. Gibbons United States Courthouse, 801 North Florida Avenue Suite 727, Tampa, FL 33602.
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The filings also show that Premier gives its assets as $0 and liabilities as in the range of $1-100 million. The creditors list is quite formidable, including Barclay's, Countrywide, Deutsche Bank, Fremont Investment & Loan, First Horizon, Fidelity & Deposit Co., Eagle Vision Capital, Home Loan Corp., Washington Mutual Bank, Wells Fargo, and many many more.
We have been hearing about Premier for a while. Here is one of the more detailed messages, from back in May (the 21st):
The Company is "Premier Mortgage Funding, Inc." The Corp office.
I worked in the Banking Department and was laid off in March along with others.
Friday, I got a call from the VP of Banking and he said that the Banking Division is no more.Everyone was let go and escorted out the door! He was also let go.
Premier is pretty much down to a skeleton crew. If you check out records in Pinellas County Clerk of Circuit Court, Florida and Michigan, you will see some of the lawsuits regarding this company. Also, check out www.pmfunds.com. You can see on that web page that funding has ceased.
Please let me know what other info that you need. This company is very well known for laying off employees all the time. I heard through the grape vine, don't know yet if it is true or not, that they are going to file BK. It is not confirmed as of yet.
Pmfunds.com has had the following message posted since perhaps mid-April:
Welcome to Premier's
Mortgage Banking DivisionEffective immediately, Premier Mortgage Banking (Premier Platinum and Banker Direct) is temporarily suspending all correspondent fundings until further notice. This temporary suspension is made necessary due to market conditions and warehouse restrictions. We will notify everyone immediately once the suspension is lifted and fundings resume.
We recommend you flip your loans to broker status with the correspondent lender it is currently submitted to. This should minimize the inconvenience you may experience and will be much easier then re-originating the loan through an entirely new broker lender.
If for any reason you choose to re-originate the loan through a different broker lender, we recommend using one (1) of our strategic broker partners. These broker partners will be able to provide you with competitive pricing and superior service. For contact information, please visit www.pmfunds.com and click on the "Strategic Broker Partners" link.
Respectfully yours,
Senior Management
Premier Mortgage Funding, Inc.
Please write in with further elaborations, if you can.
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Raveynfyre at 17:21 2010-02-17 said:
Proficio Mortgage Ventures, LLC acquired what was left of Premier in late 2009. Unfortunately due diligence was not done on the company backround in time and they found out later about the bad practices taking place. Investors refused to do business with PMV if they were going to change the company name, luckily that did not take place. Instead Premier infiltrated management and have convinced the board to close one of the operation centers, located in Jacksonville FL within the next 45 days. This was the heart of the original operation and where PMV first started doing business. With this move they are centering their operations back in the Orlando facility, the place that blew up, or imploded if you will, to begin with. Proficio will go the way of the dodo soon enough due to the poor loan management skills of the remaining Premier people. PermalinkHFlashman at 13:12 2010-04-22 said:
Well, we can guess Raveynfyre is a disgruntled person. Facts: Premier lost its warehouse lines when everyone else also felt the squeeze in the Spring of 2009. The were appraoched and agreed to merge with Proficio Mortgage Ventures (Proficio Bank) in mid 2009. PMV was badly managed running high cost/loan numbers. Old premier management was given the task in early 2010 to straighten out the issues. They have succeeded and cost/loan is now average or a little below average. I work there as an Originator. Conservative but fair Underwriting. Slim management numbers as they run a tight ship. I like it here. Well funded and run as it should be. They rely heavily upon the Regionals to train and manage their branch operations. If you have a good Regional (I am blessed with a gret one!), no problems as long as you don't try and fight the system. Overall a strong B to B+ if you're not trying to put a loan through which is round peg into a square hole. Permalinkdspacemtn at 11:52 2010-09-01 said:
I was an originator with Proficio before they the closed the Jacksonville as corporate indicated it was to make our process better, faster and cheaper, but instead the move added week to our closings process, and made our fees go up that were already above the average market. We as originators were promised more mortgage products if we stayed patient with the long turn around times, but that never happened. Lost and damaged so many relationships, I am having to rebuild. To make things worst my branch manager decided to terminate their branch because the cost of operating with Proficio was so high. Apparently, now they are having to get a attorney to battle PMV to get her own money back that they put up front to cover their monthly expenses. Am I a disgruntled person "Well hell Yes I guess I am". Permalinkadd a comment | go to forum thread
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Important: This company is on our list of lending operations that have "imploded". However, please note that "imploded" is a somewhat subjective and does not necessarily mean operations are ceased permanently: it can mean bankruptcy filing, temporary but open-ended halting of major operations, or "firesale" acquisition. All information here is provisional, and may contain inaccuracies (especially newer information). If you are planning on doing business with this company or any other one listed on this site, you should inquire with them directly on whether they can still meet your needs. Many are still operating in some capacity.