Gene Roberts

When choosing a name, Financial 21 Credit Union was looking toward the future. “The tag line we were using was ‘your financial partner for the 21st century;’” says CEO Gene Roberts. “That was around the time of the turn of the century, which was a big deal at the time.”

The former handle, Financial Federal Credit Union of San Diego, was a mouthful, and in 1998 Financial 21 changed its charter to expand from a CU for Sempra and SDG&E employees to a community credit union with virtually open membership.

Financial 21 has about 13,000 members and assets of about $132 million. Even with the community charter, “with some 29 credit unions in town, there’s a lot of choices and options, but being community chartered gives us a lot more potential than we had with just the SDG&E folks.”

Roberts will celebrate a decade with the CU in July. He’s been in the industry for 34 years, with stints at a CU in Houston, and at the California CU trade association, before taking the reins at Financial 21.

Loan demand, he says, is “pretty good, but it isn’t what it was six years ago.” Financial 21’s loans grew 8 percent last year, spurred by home equity lines of credit. Roberts says home equity loans are taking up the slack for auto loans, which are “hard to come by today with so much competition. It seems everybody has an auto loan deal,” some as low as zero percent.

Roberts says he’s not putting much credence into UCLA’s recent Anderson economic survey forecast which foresees a “cooling off” in the California economy. “We’re pretty optimistic; I don’t know how these economists can come up with these predictions.”

Financial 21’s three- to five-year plan includes offering business loans, which Roberts says will be smaller than the average commercial bank’s.

“A lot of our members operate small business, getting cash advances on credit cards to start,” he says. Financial 21 is looking at loans of between $25,000 and $50,000. “These are mom and pop operations that don’t need a million dollars.”

Roberts is not impressed with bankers’ contention that credit unions are cutting in on their territory. “CUs were started in the ’30s to help people with small business, it wasn’t just the consumer side of it. Our feeling is there’s plenty of business for everyone, and consumers should have a choice.”

The CEO sees a consolidation happening in credit unions, although he doesn’t plan for Financial 21 to be part of it. “In 1976, there were 1,800 credit unions across California. Today there are less than 600,” he says. “Unless you’re one of the three $1 billion CUs in San Diego, it’s a tough row to hoe.”