Rejected by banks, a Washington-based medical practice made ahuge step forward toward opening a 36,000-square foot officebuilding thanks to Commercial Lending Solutions, a Chetco FederalCredit Union-owned CUSO.

Yelm Medical Office Building LLC broke ground April 3 on themulti-million dollar facility that will relocate a family practiceof seven doctors to a larger space. Scott Ritter, manager of YMOB,said he and his partners went to many financial institutions butwere either turned down because of the amount of the fund requestor they weren't interested in construction lending.

"Then we met with the team at CLS. They got on board with us andwhen they described the concept of bringing money together throughseveral credit unions to fund a project of this size we were veryintrigued," Ritter said.

Three regional CUs working through CLS provided the financingand conducted their own underwriting and approval processes,according to the CUSO.

"These types of investment opportunities are exciting to us,"said Stephen Wymer, business services manager for NorthwestCommunity Credit Union and a participant. "Without the efforts of aCUSO partnering several credit unions together, these types ofprojects used to traditionally go to banks."

CLS President/CEO Jim Falls said with "good communication andlots of hard work, we were able to put together a loan that mostindividual credit unions can't due to cap issues, but together andcollectively we could."