SUMTER, S.C.–SAFE Federal Credit Union is reporting it set an auto loan record with $79.4 million in lending during its Spring 2017 “Driving You Forward” promotion, generating more than 3,000 loans and adding nearly 2,000 new members.
The credit union said $50 million of the total loan volume was in the form of indirect lending through SAFE.
According to SAFE, the total volume of new loans during the 10-week campaign was 13% higher than the previous record of $70 million, set in the Spring of 2016. For the promotion period, SAFE offered interest rates as low as 2.24%, for up to 60 months, well below its usual 2.99% auto loan rate.
The loan total exceeded SAFE’s goal of $51 million by almost 60%.
“After the great success of our 2016 promotions, in the Spring and the Fall, we believed we had pretty much saturated our auto loan market,” said VP-Lending Ronnie Warner. “With that, we may have lowered our projections a bit, but we were incredibly pleased and surprised at the results.”
The credit union said several elements drove the success of the loan campaign, including the attractive rates that were advertised heavily, with an emphasis on loan pre-approvals. Television advertising, which highlighted how SAFE auto loans fit every stage of members’ lives, also appeared to resonate very well, the credit union said.
SAFE said it generated a total of 3,108 loans, with an average loan amount of $25,546. The credit union’s Bishopville branch turned in the strongest loan performance, achieving 114% of its goal.
The $1-billion SAFE Federal Credit Union has 117,000 members.