About us

Established in 1869, SBS (Southland Building Society) is New Zealand’s largest building society

and the only building society in the world to have achieved bank registration. SBS officially received bank registration on October 7, 2008.

We have a 15-strong network of branches that spans the country. We currently have branches in Invercargill (Head Office) and Windsor, Gore, Queenstown, Cromwell, Dunedin, Timaru, Nelson, Blenheim, Hamilton, Tauranga and Christchurch (which has four branches located in Central, Ferrymead, Riccarton and Papanui).

As a mutual building society, if you borrow, save or invest with SBS, you’re known as a ‘legal owner’ or ‘member.’ Because we don’t have to pay dividends, our primary obligation is to share the results of our success with our members.

We offer a wide range of banking services and products, including transactional banking, phone and internet banking, investments, residential and commercial lending, managed funds, agribusiness, consumer finance and insurance.

SBS also has more than 200 sponsorships with organisations of all sizes throughout New Zealand. We are proud of our record of support for the communities to which our members belong and from our perspective, it’s all about giving back to the community.

In recent years SBS has invested more than $3 million in the wider SBS community. It’s important to us that we always act in our members’ best interests and, accordingly many of the decisions around where we invest in our community rest with our branch managers. After all, it’s the staff on the frontline that best knows the communities in which they work and live.

SBS employs more than 240 staff members who are based in Head Office and across the retail branch throughout the country (these figures do not include staff employed by SBS’ subsidiary companies).

SBS has four subsidiaries:

Finance Now specialises in providing retail finance, personal loans and consumer insurances.

Southsure Assurance Ltd provides a full suite of fire and general insurance products, including house, contents, car and boat policies, as well as a competitive funeral cover policy.

Funds Administration New Zealand Ltd (FANZ) provides managed funds products, including KiwiSaver and the recent addition of a Cash PIE product ensuring SBS investors have ready access to new tax advantages.

Fraser Properties Ltd owns the SBS head office building in Invercargill, which is also home to the Alliance Group and NZ Post.

Our history

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