LOS ANGELES and SAN DIEGO — Reacting to a need for a secondary marketplace to open up credit lines, DebtMarket and First Associates recently announced they have joined forces in an effort to provide a new way to sell loan originations.

Through a recently-launched DebtMarket technology platform, sellers of consumer loan portfolios can list loans representing any asset class, size, credit quality and loan performance — all of which is designed to help establish and negotiate pricing using an auction-style marketplace, according to the companies.

Moreover, loan sellers can perform due diligence with the new platform, better enabling the closing and funding of the sale.

"Our partnership with First Associates is another step in the direction of a more efficient and transparent process for pricing and selling consumer debt portfolios," said Mike Sheridan, president and co-founder of DebtMarket.

"In addition to providing a potential solution to our financial system's liquidity crisis, our intent is to partner with market leader like First Associates to bring value-added services and relationships to our clients and leverage new marketing channels with select business partners," he explained.

The companies said that the integration of the technology-based secondary market for loans with servicing needs is designed to smooth out portfolio transactions for clients of both firms. This is accomplished by speeding up the process and helping to eliminate payment disruptions for consumers who are sometimes confused about where to send payments when a loan is sold, officials said.

"First Associates offers the experience, outstanding technology, infrastructure and scalability to meet the servicing needs of the schools, banks, credit unions and other credit providers DebtMarket servers," said chief executive officer Doug Henkel of First Associates.

"Partnering with DebtMarket brings a whole new dimension to the lenders we already serve at a time when liquidity and establishing market pricing for portfolios has been an issue for them," he added.

DebtMarket sellers will pay a percentage fee only after a portfolio sale closes, according to the company. Additionally, the new partnership provides First Associates' lenders with free access to the marketplace that will help them establish market pricing for assets as well as provide an "end-to-end" transaction management platform.

For more information, visit www.debtmarket.com. For more on First Associates, visit www.1stassociates.com.