State Bank & Trust of North Dakota has completed its purchase of Bell Mortgage, a 130-year-old residential lender based in Minneapolis. No purchase price was disclosed.
The sale, brokered by Milestone Merchant Partners, closed a few days ago. Bell funds about $1 billion in mortgages a year, most of it through retail means.
The sale combines one of the largest independently owned nonbank mortgage lenders in the tri-state area (Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota) with the largest privately held bank.
The agreement to sell Bell was first announced in early November.
Bell Mortgage employs about 180 full timers at 28 mortgage offices in the Twin Cities area, Bozeman, Mont., and Phoenix. State Bank & Trust has roughly 500 employees at 14 full-service banking locations. Chartered in 1966, the bank has assets totaling more than $1.9 billion.
