GREENFIELD — With the COVID-19 pandemic impacting their customers’ ability to make ends meet financially, Greenfield Savings Bank President and CEO John Howland and the bank’s board of directors asked themselves “How can we help?”
As a solution, the bank came up with a Residential Loan Relief Program, which will allow customers to defer their mortgage and equity payments on their one- to four-family properties for up to 90 days.
“We’re not requiring that people qualify for anything,” Howland clarified. The requirement is, “have a mortgage, and call up and ask.”
No processing fees are involved and opting for the program will not impact customers’ credit scores. They can also choose 30- and 60-day deferment options. The payments for those months will then be added to the back end of the mortgage loan, Howland explained.
In some instances, Howland noted, customers’ property tax bills are larger than their monthly mortgage payments. Through the Residential Loan Relief Program, customers will not need to pay taxes through the deferment period either.
To request a deferment, customers can go to greenfieldsavings.com and fill out a survey, which involves five questions regarding how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted them. They also must choose how long they’d like to defer the payments, up to 90 days. Howland said the bank will then reach out to them with a form to sign.
“People need to be concentrating on taking care of themselves right now,” said Greenfield Savings Bank’s Marketing Director Paul Benjamin. “We want people to know that they’re going to be OK here.”
Additionally, the bank has accelerated its 2020 donations to local social service and charitable organizations in the amount of $100,000. Recipients include the United Way of Franklin County, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Franklin County, the Greenfield YMCA, the Food Bank of Western Massachusetts, the Children’s Advocacy Center and DIAL/SELF.