I've driven past that stretch on Louise Avenue near 85th Street more times than I can count — the kind of corporate corridor where every building looks like it could house either a tech startup or a mortgage company. Nick Kiesow's office at Fairway Heartland sits in one of those low-slung brick complexes on Kenton Lane, the kind of place you'd miss if you weren't looking for it.
What struck me when I finally stopped in wasn't the office itself — though it's clean, professional, the usual framed licenses on the wall — but the way Nick talks about mortgages. Most loan officers I've met treat the process like a transaction, a series of forms to push through underwriting. Nick treats it like a puzzle he's genuinely interested in solving. He'll walk you through rate structures, sure, but he'll also ask about your actual life — whether you're planning to stay in Sioux Falls long-term, whether you've thought about what happens if interest rates shift in two years, whether the house you're eyeing in McKennan Park actually fits where you're headed.
The 29 five-star reviews aren't an accident. People keep mentioning how he returned calls at 8 PM, how he explained things without making them feel stupid, how he found ways to make deals work when other lenders had already said no. That's rare in finance — someone who remembers that buying a house in Sioux Falls, even in this market, is still one of the biggest decisions most of us will make.
The one thing I'll say — and this is true of most mortgage brokers — is that the timeline can stretch longer than you'd hope. Even with someone as responsive as Nick, there are underwriting delays, appraisal backlogs, paperwork that lands in the wrong inbox. It's not his fault, but it's worth knowing going in.
If you're looking at houses anywhere from Harrisburg to Dell Rapids, Nick's worth a conversation.
— Grace