Sarah Teutrine, Residential Mortgage/Consumer Banking Officer, Providence Bank, Fairview Heights

By DENNIS GRUBAUGH
    Sarah Teutrine has watched banks come and go in her 16 years in the business, and she believes she has settled into one of the best.
    Teutrine, 38, a consumer banking officer, works at Providence Bank’s lone location in the Land of Lincoln, at 4600 N. Illinois St. in Fairview Heights. Providence also has locations in Missouri, Texas and Indiana.
    Last year, Providence acquired the former Community First Bank, the location where Teutrine now has been working almost six years.  Previously she had stints at Regions, West Pointe and People’s National Bank in a variety of capacities that provided great experience in her present job.
    “I started out in mortgage banking, then I went to consumer installment-type loan banking, then I went to commercial banking. Now I’m back to consumer mortgage. It’s more of my expertise. It’s harder to find people that know about all the new regulations,” she said.
    Most of what she does is in the secondary market, where mortgages are sold off to the government-sponsored Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac to become 30-year or 15-year fixed mortgages.
    “With rates being so low obviously that’s the best interest if the customer can go that way. But with the new federal rules and regulations there is a lot of red tape that goes that way,” she said.
    Teutrine can examine a deal, see if it would have interest to the secondary market and if not turn to her own bank for a potential in-house mortgage.
    “It’s a way to help the customer meet whatever their financial need is. I think anybody who wants to own a home, if they qualify, should be able to own a home,” she said.
    She works with a variety of income bases, grant programs and loan programs, including for first-time home buyers
    “I have a lot of aspects to my job and with all the experience it works out nicely,” she said.
    A graduate of Southwestern Illinois College with an associate’s degree in science, Teutrine has two children, son Aaron, 13, and daughter Ali, 8. She lives in Millstadt.
    She is recently back from a trip to New Orleans. She cruised the Mississippi River, went on a plantation tour and explored the swamps via airboat. She likes to travel and loves fine cooking
    “I’m a little bit of a foodie,” she said. “I like to try interesting, unique things. Personally, I’m more of a baker, cookies, cakes, pies.”
    That helps make her a hit at the office where she invariably brings goodies.