Barely had the ink dried on the sale of Delta Trust & Banking Corp. of Little Rock to Simmons First National Corp. of Pine Bluff when a flock of staffers flew the coop.
Eight employees left the Delta Trust Mortgage Inc. subsidiary to join Eagle Bank & Trust of Little Rock last week.
We understand that some members of Delta’s mortgage team bailed because they were facing cuts of more than 30 percent in their take-home pay. The departure leaves just the head of Delta’s mortgage division, Claude Cousins, and his processor.
We couldn’t reach Simmons CEO George Makris Jr. for comment on the move.
But Simmons’ loss is Eagle Bank’s gain.
Eagle Bank has been expanding its mortgage department since January. Last week, it also added an employee from the Little Rock operation of First Federal Bank, bringing the total number in the department to 16.
Eagle Bank’s mortgage department will be run by Lee Welfel, who was a vice president at Delta Trust Mortgage. His title now is executive vice president/mortgage production manager. Mike Smith, executive vice president/mortgage operations manager, also will head Eagle’s mortgage department.
“We just believe it’s a great business to serve our customers,” said Eagle Bank President and CEO Jeff Lynch. “We feel really good about the home lending business, and we just want to have a bigger presence.”
He said he expects to have a “significant amount of business” coming through the bank’s mortgage department because of the new hires.
“These are mortgage loan officers that are well established in the market and have existing sources of business,” Lynch said. “That will have an immediate impact on our overall production.”
You might recall that Delta’s mortgage subsidiary started back in 2000 when it acquired Moore Mortgage Corp. of Little Rock.