Neighborhood Trust + Self Lender

Neighborhood Trust Brings Innovative Financial Solutions to American Households Seeking Financial Stability

NEW YORK, NY – October 2, 2018.  Neighborhood Trust Financial Partners, a nonprofit social enterprise, is partnering with Self Lender, the FinTech that’s on a mission to help consumers responsibly build credit and save, to integrate the FinTech product into Trusted Advisor, its workplace financial wellness benefit. The partnership marks an important milestone in Neighborhood Trust’s ongoing effort to bring innovative financial solutions to American households seeking financial stability.

At participating employers nationally, workers will be able to seamlessly access Self Lender’s credit building and savings product as part of their Trusted Advisor Financial Action Plan, with guidance from their Neighborhood Trust Financial Counselor. Through the partnership, Neighborhood Trust and Self Lender are collaborating to reach the thousands of workers struggling to establish credit and save; to ensure clients build credit as part of a holistic financial plan; and to create a user experience that blends counseling and product enrollment to minimize the behavioral barriers to participation.

With Trusted Advisor, Neighborhood Trust’s expert financial counselors conduct confidential counseling sessions via phone or Skype, work with employees to develop an action plan to meet their needs, and send text message reminders to help employees stay on track with their goals. Trusted Advisor is available today at 56 employers reaching an eligible audience of 140,000 workers nationally.

“Our financial counseling is influenced by behavioral theory, meaning we’re focused on getting clients to take action, identifying reliable financial products that best meet their needs, and getting real results,” noted Justine Zinkin, CEO of Neighborhood Trust. “Anything we can do to make it easier for clients to adopt our suggested actions will go a long way in improving their financial health. Self Lender is among FinTechs leading the charge to transform the financial services industry and meet the needs of Americans who are struggling financially, and we’re excited to partner with them and bring their service to workers who need it most.”

“The cost of poor credit is high and it unfortunately hits those who are most vulnerable in our country the hardest,” said James Garvey, co-founder and CEO of Self Lender. “Neighborhood Trust is helping so many Americans rebuild their credit and their lives. It’s a real honor to partner with the team at Neighborhood Trust and I’m personally very excited about our mutual vision to see millions of Americans achieve healthy credit and financial stability.”

The partnership between Neighborhood Trust and Self Lender is receiving generous support from the Center for Financial Services Innovation (CFSI) through its Fintech & Nonprofit Partnerships Working Group, an initiative designed to facilitate and support partnerships between Fintech providers and nonprofit service organizations that positively impact the financial health of underserved consumers.  The Working Group is sponsored by the Financial Solutions Lab, a joint initiative between CFSI and JPMorgan Chase, with additional support from the Principal Foundation.

“We’re thrilled to support the partnership between Neighborhood Trust and Self Lender and look forward to learning from their experience,” said Josh Sledge, director at CFSI. “The two organizations share a common mission of improving financial health and both have great expertise in leveraging technology to do so. Their collaboration holds real promise for Trusted Advisor clients and peer organizations looking to form partnerships of their own.”

Trusted Advisor is on its way to serving as a holistic source of trusted financial guidance and money management. Over the next year Neighborhood Trust will continue to enhance its financial counseling platform with a suite of digital financial planning and management tools, and access to reliable financial products to help employees achieve financial health; and will integrate Trusted Advisor into workplace human resources and benefits solutions.

To learn more about Trusted Advisor, please visit www.neighborhoodtrust.org/trustedadvisor.

About Neighborhood Trust Financial Partners

Neighborhood Trust is a nonprofit social enterprise empowering workers to take control of their finances and achieve financial health. With more than 20 years of financial counseling experience, we blend our trusted financial guidance with innovative technology solutions and actionable financial products to help workers’ paychecks go further. Neighborhood Trust embeds our services where workers get paid, access financial services and make financial decisions. Annually we reach more than 10,000 low- and moderate-income workers across the country. Today, our Trusted Advisor workplace financial benefit service is in 29 states and includes customers such as Staples, FreshDirect, and Allen Health Care. For more information, visit www.neighborhoodtrust.org.

About Self Lender

Self Lender is helping thousands of people improve their financial journey with a credit-builder account, a simple way to build credit and save money at the same time. Founded in 2016, the platform offers a unique approach for consumers with no credit or poor credit to establish a payment history and build their credit scores. For more information, visit www.selflender.com.