A path to financial independence
Counseling and lending go hand-in-hand in Border FCU’s financial empowerment program.
Border Federal Credit Union($147.0M, Del Rio, TX) knew it was helping people help themselves, but after more than a decade of providing financial counseling, the credit union had no easy way of proving it. Today, BFCU uses a digital dashboard that measures its efforts, which include credit-building loans tied to counseling, at improving members’ financial lives.
BFCU provides financial counseling to more than 500 people a year, nearly all of them Latino. Two-thirds of them are female heads of household and half have an annual family income of $30,000 or less.
Many of those members also participate in the credit union’s Occupational Loan program, which offers up $2,000 to borrowers who have been working for the same company for no less than three years, are now working full-time, and are earning at least $1,000 a month. The loan is currently priced at 15% with a 24-month re-payment term.
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