Olympia’s Heritage Financial acquires Oregon-based bank for $88 million

The parent company of Olympia-based Heritage Bank is still in buying mode, announcing late Thursday that it will acquire Oregon-based Premier Commercial Bancorp in an all-stock deal valued at $88.6 million.

The acquisition is expected to close in the third quarter of this year.

Premier Commercial Bancorp, which operates Premier Community Bank, is based in Hillsboro, Oregon, outside Portland. Premier has six branches and total assets of $401 million.

“The partnership with Premier is an excellent way for us to expand our franchise in the Portland market,” said Brian Vance, president and chief executive of Heritage Financial Corp., in a statement. “Heritage has significant momentum in Portland and Seattle, which are two of the most attractive banking markets in the Northwest.”

Heritage continues to add banks to its merger portfolio at a fairly regular pace. The deal for Premier comes on the heels of its $126 million acquisition of Bellevue-based Puget Sound Bancorp and its subsidiary, Puget Sound Bank.

Under the terms of the deal, Premier shareholders will receive 0.4863 shares of Heritage common stock for each share of Premier common stock. Once the acquisition closes, Premier shareholders will own 7.7 percent of the combined company.

The acquisition also increases Heritage Financial’s total assets to $5 billion.

This story was originally published March 9, 2018 at 7:00 AM with the headline "Olympia’s Heritage Financial acquires Oregon-based bank for $88 million."