Early next year, there will be a new full service bank in operation in Pinecrest. TotalBank, chartered in 1974 and today holding $2.2 billion in assets, symbolically broke ground on its new banking center at 10205 S. Dixie Hwy., its 17th branch facility in Miami-Dade and one of four new locations the bank will open in the county by the end of 2012. The building that will house the bank branch has been under construction for several weeks.
“We’ve been very active in the Pinecrest community for many years without having a physical presence,” said Luis de la Aguilera, president and chief marketing officer. “We made the commitment well over a year ago and opened a three-man loan production office right here on this (building) site. The demographics here are very strong and already we have over 400 customers in the Pinecrest zip code, which represents over $70 million in deposits and over $50 million in lending that we’ve done, either on a residential basis or on a commercial basis.”
De la Aguilera said that kind of business makes the decision to build the new Village branch a no brainer. “If we’re seeing that kind of movement without a physical presence here,” he said, “then we feel that having a full-service banking center in Pinecrest will be a great opportunity for us.”
De la Aguilera noted that TotalBank has been active in Pinecrest for many years in many different community activities and involvements.
“We have been the charter sponsor of the Pinecrest Premier Soccer Club,” he said. “Today it has well over 1,100 kids playing soccer, and senior vice president Renato Salazar, who will be the managing director of this banking center, is a Pinecrest resident and was also a founder of the soccer club.”
TotalBank will employ seven people in the modern, new 2,500-square-foot facility.
“We are a full-service commercial bank and we’re very diversified in all of the banking products that we offer,” de la Aguilera said. “The product array stems from wealth management, residential and commercial lending, consumer lending, trade financing and letters of credit; the bank does it all.” TotalBank was acquired in 2007 by Banco Popular, the third largest commercial bank in Spain with about $200 billion in assets.
TotalBank is a wholly owned subsidiary of the banking giant, but considered a very important one strategically because it is the U.S. operation.
“We’re a community bank that has been here in Miami-Dade County for almost 40 years,” said de la Aguilera. “But we are one that has the financial power behind it to do whatever the community needs.
