Weekly Real Estate News
Summary
MetroCity Bankshares originated $85.1 million in mortgage loans in third-quarter 2026, up from $75.4 million in the previous quarter. It sold no mortgage loans in either quarter and reported weaker mortgage servicing income, despite higher overall net income.
MetroCity Bankshares originated more mortgages in the third quarter than in the preceding three months, but its mortgage servicing business continued to produce less income than it did a year ago.
The Atlanta-based bank holding company reported $85.1 million in mortgage loan production for the quarter ended September 30, up from $75.4 million in the second quarter. Its October 23 earnings release said it sold no residential mortgage loans in either period.
The production increase was approximately 13% sequentially, calculated from the bank’s disclosed totals. That is a narrower measure than applications, locks or industrywide origination trends; it describes loans MetroCity actually produced during the quarter.
Mortgage activity and the earnings mix
Mortgage servicing income was $234,000 in the third quarter, down from $271,000 in the second quarter and $516,000 a year earlier, according to the company’s financial tables. The unpaid principal balance of mortgage loans serviced for others was about $429.5 million at September 30, compared with $463.5 million three months earlier and $538.7 million a year earlier.
Those figures point to a smaller third-party servicing portfolio, but they do not establish whether any particular change came from loan payoffs, transfers, sales or other servicing activity. The release does not provide that detailed reconciliation in its headline discussion.
MetroCity’s total noninterest income declined to $4.4 million from $5.8 million in the previous quarter. Management attributed the change partly to lower gains on sales of Small Business Administration loans and a decline in the fair value of an equity investment. Residential mortgage loan sales contributed no gain during either quarter.
For the first nine months of 2026, the bank reported $262.4 million in mortgage production, compared with $352.8 million during the corresponding period in 2025. The quarterly rebound therefore comes within a weaker year-to-date mortgage picture.
Broader bank profit rises
MetroCity reported $24.3 million in third-quarter net income, up from $22.1 million in the second quarter and $17.3 million a year earlier. Diluted earnings were 84 cents a share. The bank’s net interest margin was 4.07%, down slightly from 4.11% sequentially but above the 3.68% recorded a year earlier.
The company also reported a $743,000 unrealized loss on an equity investment in a mutual fund holding fixed-income securities that support affordable housing in its markets. Accounting rules require fair-value changes in that investment to flow through earnings, even though the underlying holdings are bonds, the bank said.
MetroCity’s mortgage operation is much smaller than the national lenders whose results dominate industry coverage. Its numbers nevertheless offer a useful example of how a bank can improve quarterly production without restoring prior-year mortgage volumes or servicing revenue. SB Financial’s recent mortgage earnings provide another regional-bank comparison, although the two companies have different business models and portfolios.
Investors and mortgage-industry observers will be watching whether the latest production increase persists, and whether the serviced-loan balance stabilizes. The release supplies no basis for projecting a sustained recovery from one quarter’s rise.
Source: MetroCity Bankshares third-quarter earnings release, October 23, 2026. Featured image: Jakub Żerdzicki / Unsplash; illustrative household finance photograph.
