ATLANTA - NetBank Inc. announced an agreement Monday to acquire Market Street Mortgage, a 15-year-old lending company based in Clearwater, Fla., that has 42 offices in 11 states.
Last year Market Street Mortgage, a subsidiary of Republic Bancorp of Ann Arbor, Mich., originated $1.6 billion in loans. Republic announced that it was selling the unit for $20 million in cash and stock. The deal is expected to close in the second quarter.
Republic is also selling its $1.8 billion mortgage-servicing portfolio and exiting the servicing business.
Market Street's management team will continue to oversee the day-to-day operations of the business, which has 450 employees.
In November, NetBank formed a partnership with Homeside Lending Inc. that allows NetBank to originate mortgages through Homeside and consumers to receive online loan approval in 10 minutes. That relationship will continue after the Market Street purchase closes, a spokesman for NetBank said.
This is NetBank's second deal in a month. At the end of the March it acquired 50,000 active accounts from Houston-based Compubank.
