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DuBose duo nifty at 50
Julie Blacklidge
Fort Worth Business Press, June 21, 2002
After 50 years in business, Jimmy DuBose is counting more than his beans. He is counting his blessings.
What was once a small, local mortgage loan firm, which DuBose started in 1952 with $1,000 and two employees, has grown to more than 600 employees and total assets of more than $1 billion.
Colonial Savings and Colonial National Mortgage, formerly Fort Worth Mortgage, still are privately owned by Jimmy DuBose and family. There are no outside investors or stockholders.
DuBose, 77, started the company in Fort Worth when he was 26. The path he took to get there was a bit bumpy.
After he had returned from the Air Corps and graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a degree in business in 1949, DuBose found himself in a very unexpected position. While in east Texas buying lumber for his brothers oak flooring mill, he had dinner and drinks with a man he knew from the flooring industry.
"The next morning, I found out I had leased his sawmill," Jimmy said with a stifled chuckle. "I worked at the sawmill for almost a year. I went down there with $500 and came back with $500."
The sawmill was insured by an old high school friend who convinced DuBose to go into the mortgage loan business. He actually didn't know anything about the business at the time. "I went home that day and said, Mother, Im gonna start a business. I couldnt even remember what it was, so I had to call my friend to find out," he said.
Soon, his book of business was building up rather quickly and so was his reputation around town.
Another friend, a Prudential agent, suggested his next big business move. Another man in town, Warren McCeever, who was the president of the Fort Worth Real estate board and was also a very active realtor and builder, was also building up a book of business selling home loans.
"My friend said, Youve got half the business in town, McCeevers got the other half. What dont you all start a company?" And they did.
It wasnt long before Jimmy found himself in the position to buy McCeever out. He soon found another partner, Lee Dickerson, who stayed with the company until about 15 years ago.
"I ended up owning all of the company, which is a very unusual thing," DuBose said.
Along the way, he developed a few other companies, including DuBose Insurance, which also recently turned 50, Colonial Lloyds Insurance Company and Colonial Life Insurance Company of Texas.
In 1972, DuBose bought Colonial Savings, a savings and loan located in Lewisville.
"That was a big part of our growth," he said. "It had about $3 million in assets at the time. I bought it for a small amount of capital." With Colonial Savings as the parent company of Fort Worth Mortgage, he was able to provide loans from the companys own bank.
Jim DuBose, Jimmys son and current president of Colonial, said his father bought the savings and loan because he had to borrow money from local banks for his warehouse clients in order to fund the mortgage loans he was closing. This way, it could all be done in-house.
The company has weathered many storms, including recession and, even more devastating, the savings and loan crisis of the 80s.
Jimmy had dabbled in home and commercial real estate development, but saw the pitfalls and dangers involved with the high-risk projects that passed by his desk.
"Back then, and this is funny, a developer came to me and said, You put of the money, and well split the profits. Uh, no", DuBose said. "Id seen too many drummed up ideas go sour and I didnt think it was a smart move."
Former Colonial President George Ogle said there were only about two or three savings and loans in the state that survived the crisis.
"We were the largest one to survive that," Ogle said. "The reason is, we never got into the acquisition and development type lending. We stayed to the traditional mortgage banking operation."
Jimmys business intuition and foresight is what Donna Dempsey, chief financial officer and executive vice president, sees as the foundation of the companys success. "I have the highest repsect for the man and I think so does everybody else around here," Dempsey said. "Hes extremely intelligent and intuitive. Jim has inherited that from his Dad."
Jim, 45, took over as president in 1994.
"There wasnt any problem with him being my son," Jimmy said. "Everybody knew that he was the heir apparent and they knew I would give him as much as he would take."
Jim didnt jump into the position of president. His first job at the company was mowing lawns when he was a kid. His first job on the payroll was as a teller at a branch office in Austin where he was attending graduate school at the University of Texas.
He then ran a mortgage branch in Austin and slowly worked his way up.
"It came about naturally," said Dempsey, who has worked at the company 26 years. "As people would leave and the position would come open and he was ready, thats when he would move up. Its not like we got rid of anybody just so Jim could have the position."
It wasnt set in stone that Jim would follow in Jimmys footsteps. There was no pressure from Jimmy or his wife, Joy, just hopeful patience.
"Its been a wonderful thing for me because Ive felt like this way we could perpetuate the company," Jimmy said. "After 50 years in the business, youd think that this would be something youd like to see continued. Why not go for 100 years?"
Though many people believe Jimmy is retired, Dempsey said that is far from reality. Jimmy still heads Colonial Lloyds Insurance and DuBose Insurance.
"When it comes to making decisions and putting his two cents in about where he thinks we ought to go and what we ought to be doing, he still does that," she said.
But he doesnt meddle. He leaves the final decisions to Jim.
"Its obvious that they are father and son," Ogle said. "They are both very dedicated to the business and both are very concentrated on their efforts to keep the mortgage company growing."
"We have been really fortunate to have a phenomenal working relationship," Jimmy said. "If he doesnt like something, he lets me know it. I can only think of two or three times where weve had a heated discussion about something."
Jims two daughters, Anna (13) and Jamie (11), are being watched by Jim and his wife Tori with hushed excitement to see if any interest in running the company takes root.
"At this point, neither one of them are showing a whole lot of interest in it, but when I was 13, I wasnt interested, either," Jim said.
The future of Colonial is headed to a more national role. About 60 percent of its mortgages are originated outside of Texas. That is why the company recently changed its name from Fort Worth Mortgage to Colonial National Mortgage.
About a third of its business is retail, a third is wholesale and a third is credit union, Jim said. Those three areas are different, but all are related to residential mortgages.
"Those new areas are going to be really exciting to try to develop over the next few years," Jim said. "We are also going to continue to pursue the more traditional banking - our retail deposit base, car loans, personal loans - the more traditional banking."
Jim said Colonial is large enough and has enough capital to expand and grow the next several years. The possibility of going public has been discussed over the years, but neither Jim nor Jimmy has given it much thought.
"Its just so much in my Dads blood and my blood both, and we enjoy it so much that I cant imagine wed ever give it up," Jim said. "He (Jimmy) set up this company and did such a phenomenal job. Its just a matter of keeping the boat in the water and headed in the right direction. I see at least another 20 years with the company before I retire."
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