Busey Bank’s Suzanne Stachura named CCAR Affiliate of the Year Award

Banks are built on the backbone of trust. 

But it’s more than being an FDIC insured bank. It’s often based on relationships that happen at the teller’s desk or in the loan office.

Suzanne Stachura knows how important each relationship is. In her first year as a mortgage originator at Mahomet’s Busey Bank, Stachura focused on building trust with clients.

It was a trait she learned in high school as she did clerical work for a mortgage company part-time. 

“It’s a task-oriented type job where you get to help people out,” Stachura said. “I really enjoyed that.”

By 2007, Stachura had a degree from the University of Illinois, and secured a job with a local real estate title company. She worked her way from receptionist into a role that led to closings.

It was relationships built during her time spent working for the title company that led Stachura to an opportunity back in the lending world after a stint away from the industry.

“What’s kind of funny is it came a little bit full circle for me at that point in time. I ended up processing and underwriting for the guy who owned the mortgage company when I was in high school,” she said. 

With a breadth of experience in underwriting and processing loans, Stachura decided to take the leap into the sales side of the mortgage process, joining Busey.

“I really just hit the ground running, running from there,” she said. “And I think my background in operations has really helped me out quite a bit.”

Having been in the real estate industry for a combined total of almost 11 years, Stachura knew that credibility came first when approaching mortgage lending.

The Busey staff, though, welcomed her with open arms, understanding the depth of her knowledge in operations and loan origination software.

“Knowing all of that earned me some instant clout,” she said. “I feel like they respect me and value my opinion, immediately from day one. I still have people come to me and ask me processing and underwriting questions or how we should configure our loan origination system.”

The respect Stachura earned also spilled over into her real estate partner and client base as customers approached buying a home.

Many times that process begins with a buyer pre-approval letter from a mortgage lender. 

“Anybody who works in the business knows that it’s only really as good as the paper that it’s written on,” she said. “Ultimately the person who wrote it, you either trust that person did their job to make sure that that buyer is actually qualified to buy that home, or somebody just slapped something together and gave them a letter. 

“Ultimately, a realtor’s income depends on my ability to do my job well up front.”

For all parties involved: the buyer, seller and realtor, Stachura wants to see the home sale go through rather than end in disappointment a few days prior to closing. 

Aside from building trust through providing reliable pre-approval letters, Stachura really focused on providing realtors with tools to make their customer experience unique. She makes open house kits with water, snacks and candles to help the realtor have a competitive edge.

“I’m just always looking for things that I can do to add value to helping them grow their business,” she said. 

Realtors noticed the effort Stachura put into them over the last 12 months. She was nominated for and won the Champaign County Association of Realtors Affiliate of the Year Award in September. 

“It was very overwhelming,” she said. “I actually had a couple people send me the (nominating) forms, so I could see what they wrote about me. And it literally brought me to tears. It means so much to me that everything that I’ve been trying to do and the things that I think that I’m trying to put out there, that it’s coming full circle and that it’s being realized and perceived that same way on the other end. 

“It was a tremendous honor to have been even nominated for the award having only been in the business on the sales side of things for a year.”

COVID-19 brought new challenges and some opportunities to the real estate industry in 2020. Ideas that Stachura had were put on hold as the pandemic began to take hold. She said banks were overwhelmed with people looking to refinance their homes with low mortgage rates. 

But, through that, she was happy to see that realtors didn’t feel like they had been put on the back burner.

“It’s good to know and reassuring to know that I’m able to maintain those relationships, even with the social distancing,” she said. “And with the time challenges that I’ve definitely been experiencing, just like every lender.

Stachura said she plans to continue to build opportunities for her business affiliates. As a member of the Women’s Business Council of Champaign County, she recently listened to a presentation about the difference between marketing and branding. 

“I just found what she had to say so interesting and compelling that I’m thinking about trying to put a seminar and partner with her in supporting other women in the community, helping lift each other up, and really, all the things that we can do to add value to one another.”