community involvement to his employees.
Pride Mortgage
President: Brian Farley
Location: Middletown
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Type of Business: mortgages for second homes
Year Founded: 1997
Employees: 36
Annual Sales: WND
Brian Farley started Pride Mortgage in 1997, using what he learned at large and small banks. The 15-year veteran of the finance world said, just like the big banks, he shoots to have the latest in high-tech innovations for his four-location business based out of Middletown.
The business includes a fully transactional Web site and computer system that cut down on paperwork. And, Farley’s green Volvo sedan doubles as a mobile office with all the gadgets needed to run the business no matter where he finds himself.
But like a small bank, Pride aims to have a foothold in community organizations from the local Chamber of Commerce to the town theater group – that’s been the key to finding his customers.
“When you live and work in a community, you want to support the organizations that are important to your neighbors and clients. They are pretty much the same people,” said Farley, Pride’s president.
He added that the technology has boosted the efficiency side of Pride, freeing his employees from burdensome paperwork. This feature allows them to spend time outside the office doing things like working in the community.
This philosophy has turned out to be a good business strategy. These measures breed loyalty and are instrumental in creating repeat business, which makes up 40 percent of Pride’s clientele, he says.
In 2002, Pride completed $256.5 million in mortgages, a 65 percent increase over the previous year. The company, which specializes in mortgages for second homes, is among the top growing small businesses, according to surveys based on sales growth by the Providence Business News.
Farley says his employees are members of about 20 different groups ranging from softball leagues to an HIV/AIDS research and treatment center to the Provincetown Art Association on Cape Cod.
In addition to service to these groups, Pride employees build relationships with other organization volunteers who at times “will be looking for a mortgage.”
He says given that loans are often negotiated with these out-of-office colleagues, it’s important his employees view a mortgage as a significant step in a person’s life, not just another transaction. With this in mind, the experience they have at Pride will “hopefully” be positive enough for a customer to recommend the company to others.
“I want to be the first guy someone thinks about when it comes to mortgages,” Farley said. “And, since these customers might be in the same organization as my employees, you have to treat them right.”
This is different from how some in the industry view clients, he says.
According to Farley, the mortgage industry is like the banking industry in that mid-size outfits are being acquired by larger mortgage outfits. In addition, low mortgage rates of the past few years have led to a boom in the number of companies that are in the business of mortgages.
“Lots of mortgage companies do not take the time to educate their workers to provide solid services, which shortchanges clients,” he said. “Our goal is to make sure the transaction is understandable and successful.”
Farley also said the industry has gained an unfavorable stereotype fueled by bothersome e-mails and phone calls to get company names out in the market. Farley says this tactic may be effective at generating a number of clients, but it’s not his style.
“(Pride) isn’t a sweatshop to see how many mortgages we can put out in a week,” he said. Farley grew up in Old Bridge Township, N.J., and first went to work at the tiny Central Jersey Savings and Loan. He then switched gears and joined the largest bank in the area at that time, First Fidelity.
“It was at Central Jersey I learned about getting involved in the community and servicing clients. The larger banks had the efficiencies,” he said. “These are both good fundamentals to have.”
His banking experiences would later take him to Florida and Massachusetts and eventually Rhode Island where he worked at a mortgage company in Cranston starting in 1992. Claiming to be “too big for his britches,” he started the Pride company in Middletown with himself and two support people. Today, his staff includes 36 members spread out in locations from Middletown to Boston, Provincetown, Mass., and Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. Although these locations are not places one might think to locate a mortgage business, these sites do have a common thread – vacation homes.
Mortgages for second homes has been a niche market that Farley said he has successfully tapped. It is a market his expertise matches nicely. With the exception of his Boston store, his locations are in or near areas with a substantial number of vacation homes.
In the case of his Boston business, however, he says he’s gained a number of clients through his Provincetown location that hail from Boston. It made sense to extend his business to reach the first-home market of those residents he’s fostered relationships with on Cape Cod.
Farley said the Rhode Island base is strategically located near Newport, but that wasn’t the sole reason to place his headquarters there.
“When I started the business, the two support people that worked with me lived near Middletown,” he said. “That was the reason I chose to open there.”
