“You’re pre-approved!” said the big bank. “Go out and find your new family home.”
“Excellent.”
(Weeks later) “We found the new place and put in an offer!”
“Yeah, we can’t approve that,” said the bank.
Can you imagine? You’ve been assured that your bank is behind you, and then they pull the rug out from under you.
It happened to Dr. Eric Phillippi, who was just taking over the medical practice now known as Medical Procedures of Wisconsin.
This sorry-not-sorry episode was one of the most stressful of Eric’s life. He had a written pre-approval that was no longer worth the paper it was written on. Thankfully, that stress only lasted for less than a day.
He contacted his realtor. “I think you should talk to Oak Bank,” the realtor advised.
Eric called Jim McNulty, senior vice president–business banking at Oak Bank, right away.
“I was frantic at that point,” Eric recalls. “And Jim’s response was, give me the night to figure it out, but I think we’re going to be able to do this for you. And sure enough, within 24 hours from being introduced to each other, Jim said, ‘We can make this work. We can approve this.’”
Exhale.
“This is community banking fundamental stuff,” Jim says. “You’re out there helping people in your medical practice, creating jobs, running a good business. You should get credit for that from your bank. Too often, the ‘big bank’ experience is, ‘who’s my relationship manager this month?’ There’s a lot of turnover. So how are they going to really get to know your character?”
If the story finished there, we’d chalk it up to a happy ending. But there was another obstacle to overcome.
After taking over the medical practice, Eric learned he had a ‘short leash’ — or should we say, lease.
“The folks who owned that building were planning to knock it down and build an apartment complex,” Eric said, “and they were only going to extend my lease for six months. This was a very undesirable situation for me as my goal was to build a successful medical practice that would last well into the future.”
Eric called Jim to discuss buying and renovating a new location.
“That was where our business banking relationship really accelerated,” Eric recalls. “Creating a long runway for the future of the business.”
Once again, Jim came back with a quick “yes.”
“Eric had the savviness to create a new space with income, which would be a long-term asset for him and his family,” Jim says. “We had multiple balls in the air at that time, but we were able to put the right resources in front of Eric and create the best solution.”
“I just remember being on that video call with Jim,” Eric recalls, “and Jim said, ‘of course we’re going to make this work!’ And I glanced over at a picture of my family, and I started crying.”
Happy tears for happy ending number two.
