Top 20 NYC Residential Lenders 2016

• Wells Fargo issued the highest number of mortgages this year – 2,081
• JP Morgan Chase issued luxury home mortgages for the sum of $414 million
• The lowest median down payment – 13% – was operated by Homebridge Financial Services

In a place like New York, where home prices are sky-high and demand is never lacking, financial institutions get a lot of business from residential sales requiring financing. How much business, to be precise? We took a look at the numbers in 4 boroughs – Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx – for 2016 to find out just that.

What we found was that, while two of the four banking giants in the US – Wells Fargo and JP Morgan Chase –  dominated the overall and luxury markets in terms of number of mortgages issued, a few other smaller institutions were also very successful in making home buyers their clients. We also had a look at the median down payment rate practiced by each of the busiest 20 banks last year, to give you an idea of how accessible a loan might be to a potential buyer.

Wells Fargo was the largest mortgage provider in 2016

Here are the top 5 banks providing the highest number of home-purchase mortgages across New York (excluding Staten Island, due to lack of mortgage data) – see below for the full Top 20 list:

Wells Fargo Bank had the most mortgages issued in 2016. The second largest bank in home mortgage services in the U.S., Wells Fargo granted 2,081 loans this year in NYC, and claimed a 25% median down payment on those loans.

Another one of the 4 banking giants, JP Morgan Chase counted 1,584 mortgages on newly-bought homes, and asked a higher median down payment of 28%.

Meanwhile, Citizens Bank, a much smaller institution, ranked third in our list, with a strong count of 591 mortgage loans over the year, and the lowest median down payment in our top 5 – 21%.

A surprisingly high activity was recorded by the Chinese private bank First American International Bank. Ranking at #4, it issued a total of 338 loans for home purchases, while asking the highest down payment on our list, amounting to 50% of a home’s value.

Citibank ranked at #5, with 331 mortgages issued this year, and charged a median down payment in line with the city-wide median percentage of 26%.

Mortgage lenders with low down payments in New York

Of the 20 financial institutions that made the above list, Homebridge Financial Services had the lowest median down payment, a mere 13%. Specialized in home mortgages and refinancing, this private non-bank lender, operating at national level, financed 96 home purchases in New York last year.

Bayport Funding, a boutique lending firm specializing in short-term loans, also had a very low median down payment – 14% – and financed a similar number of home purchases in 2016. Meanwhile, Bethpage Federal Credit Union, a company from Long Island that only this year opened a branch in Manhattan, won over 164 clients, and had a below-market median down payment of 19%.

JP Morgan Chase was the biggest lender on the luxury market

As for the banks that financed luxury home purchases – those above $5M – JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo lead in both number and total value of mortgages issued for the purchase of luxury condos and single-family houses in 2016. We estimate that JP Morgan Chase will credit a total of $414 million dollars in mortgages by the end of this year, based on figures recorded before early December. See the top ten banks giving out the highest number of mortgages for luxury homes below:

Take a closer look at the mortgage market

Interested in buying a home in New York? Then you’ll want to read our report on the state of the mortgage market in each of the 4 boroughs to see where the median down payment stands now, and what the mortgage trends are in these markets. See the full story here.

Methodology:

The analysis covers 4 boroughs in New York: Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx. We excluded Staten Island due to lack of available data on mortgages.

When compiling the data for this report – mortgage count, median down payment and total value of mortgages issued by a bank– we took into account the following residential property types: condo, single- and two-family houses. Co-ops in New York City are not considered real property, and mortgage data is not publicly disclosed, therefore they were not included in our study.

All figures reported are yearly estimates based on data gathered up until early December, 2016.