Two Michigan companies – Xtend, Inc., a Grand Rapids-based multi-owned cooperative CUSO, and Neighborhood Mortgage Solutions (NMS), a Frankenmuth-based mortgage CUSO, have combined resources to help drive mortgage application activity for their mutual clients. For the initial project, Xtend’s Communication Services business unit will provide project management, data mining and outbound member communication execution, and the loan specialists from NMS will handle the loan origination process. Two credit unions – Grand Rapids-based Meijer Credit Union and Fife Lake-based Forest Area Federal Credit Union – have contracted the CUSOs for this initial project.

“These early mover projects are the culmination of dialogue between our two CUSOs for several months,” said Xtend President Scott Collins. “NMS was looking for a cost-effective way to drive more mortgage lending activity for their credit union client, and we were looking to increase the amount of outbound member-direct communication that we could provide for ours. The fact that our two companies have a good number of common clients made it even easier for us to design a win-win-win solution for the credit unions and our CUSOs.”

Julie Gessner, Manager of Communication Services for Xtend, described the project as ‘a circle of communication.’ “Our teams will mine the credit unions core data to identify members with mortgages outside the credit union, coordinate a mailing to those members, deliver corresponding e-marketing materials to those same members, then follow with outbound calls. Leads will be passed to the NMS teams for their experts to handle on the origination side.” Gessner noted that this is not the first time that Xtend had supported a mortgage campaign, but it was the first time they had worked jointly with NMS. She noted, “If our past mortgage campaigns are any indication, we are confident that the NMS teams will be busy from the first day our agents start calling members.”