Interfirst Mortgage gets $175M investment

Interfirst Mortgage, a Chicago-based lender that originates in the retail and third-party channels, raised $175 million in capital from a group of investors led by StoicLane.

Other participants in the fundraising round included Oaktree Capital Management, MFA Financial, family offices and individual strategic investors.

"The mortgage industry is fragmented and ripe for disruption by tech-enabled, customer-centric platforms," said Al Goldstein, co-founder, CEO and chairman of StoicLane, in a press release. "We look forward to partnering with Interfirst's talented management team and employees to help accelerate the realization of Interfirst's potential."

StoicLane announced its launch on Sept. 28, with plans to make investments in finance, insurance and real estate — what it termed FIRE — businesses.

Eric Michael Clarke

The current version of Interfirst was created in 2011 when NetMore America combined its operations into InterBank Mortgage. The company purchased the Interfirst brand name from Citigroup in 2014; Citi had come into possession of the brand when it acquired the parent of the original InterFirst, ABN Amro Mortgage, in 2007.

Market conditions caused Interfirst's management team to suspend operations in July 2017. The company was planning to resume business, but ironically, the disruption caused by the pandemic led management to bring the company back to life sooner than planned, in June 2020.

More recently, Interfirst entered the non-qualified mortgage market with a non-owner occupied product.

"StoicLane's investment in Interfirst signifies their confidence in our commitment to innovate and deliver best-in-class technology for the mortgage industry," Interfirst CEO Dmitry Godin said in the press release. "This partnership will help us continue to build as we drive the mortgage industry forward."

MFA Financial, a real estate investment trust that invests in private-label securities, completed the purchase of the remaining shares in flip and fix lender Lima One on July 1.

Oaktree Capital also has made a number of investments in the mortgage industry, most recently providing debt financing to Ocwen. In the past it held ownership stakes in mortgage servicer Selene and flip and fix lender Genesis Capital.