Maria Echeverria, A Transnational Loan Client

Alante Financial offers “transnational loans,” which allow immigrant customers to apply for and repay a loan in the U.S. for the purchase of a home or land in their home countries. Research shows that over 50 percent of immigrants from Latin America are interested in purchasing a house in their home countries. The Alante Financial network of financial institutions in Latin America, including banks and microfinance institutions, connected by ARIAS, its money transfer platform, allows the company to offer services that meet the demands of transnational families. Due to the transnational nature of immigrant families, customer needs vary substantially. The strength of Alante Financial stems from its ability to accommodate all these individual needs.

Mrs. Maria Echeverria, a 40-year-old Salvadoran who came to the U.S. in 1985 in the midst of El Salvador’s civil war, is one of the company’s first transnational customers. She is repaying a loan provided by Integral, one of MFIC’s partner microfinance institutions, for the purchase of a piece of land in her home town, where she plans to build a house and a farm in the future.

One major challenge that Maria faced was that the transaction had to be completed immediately. Mr. Jose Chavez, her husband’s friend, needed to sell a piece of land that he owned in El Salvador to pay medical bills for his wife, who was critically ill. Maria came to Alante Financial to discuss her application for a transnational loan so that she could purchase the land. The next day Maria flew to El Salvador to visit the site and meet with Integral.

But the major challenges that Maria faced in completing this transaction were not done yet. A local property appraiser came up with a price that was far less than the offered price and Integral decided to lend closer to the appraisal value. Having served Ms. Echeverria as a loan and remittance customer for over a year and half, Alante Financial was able to offer her a consumer loan that filled the funding gap. Maria was able to purchase the land. Despite the fact that all of this transpired during Semana Santa, a major holiday week in Latin America, Alante Financial was able to complete the entire approval process in just ten days.

Unlike the majority of Salvadoran immigrants, Maria has bank accounts in the U.S. and in El Salvador, but she says that it would be very difficult for her to obtain a loan from a Salvadoran bank. Moreover, being able to repay the loan in the U.S. makes her life much easier.

Maria says she is grateful for the trust that Alante Financial gave her. She says that purchasing a house in her home country is the dream that many in her community share. She hopes that Alante Financial will open more branches and extend the same services to her peers from other parts of the region.