Guaranty opens two loan-production offices

Offices in West Plains and Mountain Grove held soft openings about two weeks ago, according to Shaun Burke, Guaranty Bank president and CEO.

Jeana Hall, a resident of Mountain Grove with seven years of experience with mortgage-lending products, has been hired to lead the offices. She will alternate between the West Plains primary office and the Mountain Grove satellite office.

Burke said Hall will work on her own with the support of Guaranty’s Springfield operations – at least at first.

“With the mortgage operation business, we have the back office staff and the technology to support her out of this market,” he said. “The LPO arrangement is a really good way for organizations to test the waters; the more successful we are, it will probably require us to consider full-service branches at some point.”

The two-office setup also will work well for customers, Burke said, because Hall can cover the entire five-county area that’s very rural in some places.

Guaranty Bank is the principal subsidiary of Guaranty Federal Bancshares Inc. It has eight branches and 20 automated teller machines in Greene and Christian counties.