Ellen J. Klapper, an assistant vice president at Cambridge Savings Bank, said in an interview last month that the bank does not discriminate in lending.

"We do not discriminate against any area in Cambridge," Klapper says.

Klapper says the bank makes lending decisions based on an appraisal of the property, the applicant's employment and credit history and the ability of the applicant to provide a down payment.

Although some applicants come to the bank on their own, Klapper says the mortgage department's primary focus is on the real estate market.

For this reason, three of the bank's four mortgage executives are paid 50 percent salary and 50 percent commission to solicit in the real estate and business communities, Klapper says.

Although the representatives are supposed to solicit throughout the city, clearly it is in their short-term financial interest to work in more affluent areas.

"They make a lot of money," Klapper says.

Cambridge Trust Company, another of the city's lenders, received 50 applications in Cambridge in 1992, according to the company's Home Mortgage Disclosure Act report.

All but two applications were approved. The bank received no application from areas 3, 4, and 5. (Tracts 3524, 3525, 3526, 3527, 3528, 3532, and 3533.)

These tract lie in the neighborhoods of East Cambridge and Cambridgeport, which had the third, fourth, and fifth lowest per capita income (out of 13) in 1989.

George Beal, vice president of Cambridge Trust, said in an interview this month that the lack of applications from these areas may be due to the location of the bank's branches in the Kendall Square and Harvard Square areas.

Unlike Cambridge Savings Bank, Cambridge Trust does not employ commissioned loan executives, but relies rather on walk-in applications, Beal says.

"It's all really walk-in," Beal says, adding. "Our rate really has not been very competitive recently because we don't sell to the secondary market."

This combination of higher interest rates and a lack of sales representatives may discourage borrowing in certain areas, Beal says.

Beal says he expected the bank would receive no applications from the Central Square area because Cambridge Trust has no office there.