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It was a tough year for many kinds of real estate lending last year, but banks, credit unions and mortgage companies active in Connecticut put in a strong showing, with some even managing to increase their loan totals year-over-year.
Every year, The Warren Group, publisher of The Commercial Record, compiles the top 10 mortgage lenders among Connecticut’s credit unions, banks and mortgage companies, ranked by number of loans and loan volume in several origination categories. All loans were originated in 2023.
Michigan-based United Wholesale Mortgage originated 1,183 single-family purchase mortgages for $4214.98 million in volume, the most in-state. The company also had 251 condominium purchase mortgages worth $55.3 million, the second-most among all lenders in Connecticut last year after Milford-based Total Mortgage Services, which clocked in at 266 condo purchase loans worth $57.88 million. Total Mortgage was also the most prolific Connecticut-based single-family purchase lender, with 1,065 loans worth $348.86 million.
Navy Federal Credit Union again led credit unions with $69.85 million in single-family purchase mortgages over 189 loans. Navy Federal also had 28 condominium loans for $5.93 million, falling to third place by volume among credit union condo lenders behind Charter Oak Federal Credit Union ($7.2 million in volume across 25 loans) and Sikorski Financial Credit Union (33 loans worth $7.02 million).
JPMorgan Chase had the most single-family purchase volume among bank lenders with about $338.81 million in loans, but its 381 loans had it land at second place after Citizens Financial Group’s 399 loans. Citizens was third for single-family purchase volume with $218.58 million. Newtown Savings Bank had the most condominium loan volume among banks, with $26.98 million across 104 loans, and Liberty Bank made the largest number of condo loans: 115.
Who were Connecticut’s top lenders of 2022? See our rankings to find out.
The top Connecticut-based bank lender for single-family purchase mortgages in 2023 was Newtown Savings Bank, which edged out Middletown-based Liberty $149.55 million in loans versus Liberty’s $124.71 million. However, Liberty beat out Newtown Savings and all other Connecticut-based banks with 380 single-family loans to runner-up Newtown Savings’ 353.
Among nonpurchase residential loans, a category which covers single-family, condominium, two-family and three-family properties and which combines refinances and home equity lending, many lenders saw their loan totals and loan volumes collapse compared to 2022, thanks to interest rates that left many Americans with primary mortgage rates hundreds of basis points below the typical interest rate on a 30-year fixed-rate loan.
However, two clear winners emerged: Liberty Bank and M&T Bank.
M&T managed to retain most of the former People’s United Bank’s market share despite the sometimes-rocky process that attends any huge bank merger: It clocked in $326.6 million in loans compared to the $330.95 million its acquisition target made in 2022. The bank even increased its total number of nonpurchase loans over People’s United, 1,467 to 1,345.
And Liberty Bank did what might have seemed impossible, growing its nonpurchase business. It made 150 more of these loans in 2023, for a total of 2,028 worth $301.83 million – albeit a total volume that was down somewhat from the $363.4 million it made in 2022.
