The new 3,071-square-foot branch will be more convenient for Fifth Third customers, and will provide easier access to the bank’s ATMs and drive-through banking lanes, said Jeff Kursman, spokesman for the Cincinnati-based bank. The interior of the bank has an open floor design and state-of-the-art automatic teller machines, Kursman said. “The whole design is all about enhancing interaction with customers,” the bank’s spokesman said.
Kursman declined to reveal the total project cost of demolition and construction. The bank purchased the tract of land, which was just under one acre, last year for $1.3 million, according to Montgomery County property records.
Fifth Third’s significanat investment in moving a branch from inside an enclosed shopping center to a high-profile location facing Far Hills Avenue illustrates the intensity of the competition among banking institutions in the Dayton-area market. The new Fifth-Third Financial Services Center is a few hundred feet from an existing PNC bank branch that is located on the west end of the Town & Country center, just south of the Stroop Road-Far Hills Avenue intersection.
The upscale l’Auberge, which was founded in 1979, closed in early 2012 after Lebanon, Ohio-based LCNB National Bank foreclosed on the restaurant and took possession of the property. LCNB first started foreclosure proceedings in 2010, claiming l’Auberge defaulted on three mortgage notes and owed the bank more than $1.6 million.
Josef Reif and the late Dieter Krug founded l’Auberge, which earned a coveted and rare four-star rating from the Mobil Travel Guide the first year it was eligible for rating, and held the rating for 19 years through 2002.
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