LendersForum.net is devoted to raising the level of conversation within the commercial lending community.  Commercial Lending is more demanding than ever, and knowledge, experience, and expertise often separates good loans from charge offs.  As complex and demanding a profession as it is, it is not rocket science. When you get behind the curtain you won’t find a wizard, but talented professionals committed to helping business owners manage and grow their most important financial asset, their business.

Over time our goal is to fill the site with information in a variety of formats that will be useful to all the relevant stakeholders, including lenders, credit professionals, business owners, the legal and accounting community, the turnaround management community, intermediaries, and others who support the corporate financing business. We welcome input from all corners of the business community in the form of articles, weblinks and audio, video and PowerPoint presentations relevant to owners, managers and advisors to the lending community. We will work hard to earn your trust by treating your contributions with respect and giving full credit to our contributors and providing weblinks to their sites.

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Nicole Ragan, Editor-in-Chief
Nicki Ragan is Publisher of BankTalk, the Newsletter for Banking Professionals and Director of Marketing for Southeastern Commercial Finance, LLC.  She has developed comprehensive marketing strategies for financial institutions across multiple media; including digital, internet, audio, video, and print.  Nicki has been quoted and interviewed by numerous publications and has placed content in leading financial publications, including the Memphis and Birmingham Business Journals, The Secured Lender, and the ABF Jounal.  Prior to joining SoutheasternCommercial Finance in 2005, she worked for a decade in market development across a variety of industries including construction, publishing, retirement planning, and non-profit associations.  Nicki holds a B.S. in Advertising from University of Florida.Contact Nicki @ nicki.ragan@southeasterncommercial.com or by phone at (407) 341-6044.

Patrick Trammell, Publisher
Pat Trammell has been a commercial banker and asset based lender for more than 20 years, initially as a banker with SouthTrust Corporation and since 1996 as a founder of Southeastern Commercial Finance, LLC.  Over the past twenty years he has originated and managed more than 500 secured loan transactions with aggregate values in excess of  $1 billion.  His experience includes start ups, mergers, turnaround situations, initial public offerings, high growth situations, workouts, acquisitions and diverstitures. Pat is President of

Southeastern Commercial Finance, LLC and a member of the Executive Committee of the Commercial Finance Association, the international trade association of the Asset Based Financial Services and Factoring Industries.  He has a strong personal interest in industry education, and has developed content and taught numerous courses for the American Institute of Banking, the Commercial Finance Association, and the International Factoring Association.  He is a certified public accountant, and graduated from the University of Alabama at Birmingham with a degree in Accounting in 1986 and the Manderson Graduate School of Business at the University of Alabama in 1988.Contact Pat at pat.trammell@southeasterncommercial.com or by phone at (205) 250-8026.