Investors Bancorp CEO Kevin Cummings and a Brooklyn Federal Savings branch at 81 Court Street

New Jersey-based Investors Bancorp acquired Brooklyn Federal Bancorp for $10.3 million, Long Island Business News reported, while unloading most of Brooklyn Federal’s commercial real estate loan portfolio to a separate, unnamed, real estate investment fund.

Brooklyn Federal is the parent company of Brooklyn Federal Savings Bank, which has five branches in Brooklyn and Long Island and has $470 million in assets and $411 million in deposits. With Brooklyn Federal in tow, investors will have $10.7 billion in assets, $7.2 billion in deposits and 85 branches in New Jersey, Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island.

Brooklyn Federal agreed to the transaction because of the increasing costs of complying with government regulation, such as Dodd-Frank, according to analysts interviewed by LIBN…. [more]

The record rainfall in March followed by the rain showers in April will provide beautiful flowers this month. The same seems to be the case when it comes to the appetite of local financial institutions to offer very attractive multi-family financing, primarily in the Garden State.

Well-capitalized and smaller institutions, including Investors Savings Bank, NVE Bank, Kearney Federal, North Jersey Community Bank and Oritani Bank, are actively sourcing new transactions.

In April, Investors Bancorp, the parent company of Investors Savings Bank, purchased $575 million of deposits and 17 branches of Millennium bcpbank. The bank, which has been quite active in providing multi-family financing over the past 18 months, continues to be bullish for these loans. … [more]