BANKING/FINANCE : In Rare Occurrence, Sale of <i> Healthy </i> Thrift Nears Completion

Taiwanese businessman J.S. Chang is expected to get the go-ahead from federal savings and loan regulators in the next week or two to purchase Universal Savings Bank in Orange for $13.1 million to $13.6 million, his lawyer said Tuesday.

The deal is a rarity among today’s news about regulators selling off failed S&Ls;: This one involves a healthy institution.

“I can’t think of any other healthy thrifts in California that were sold this year,� said Chang’s lawyer, Keith T. Holmes of Los Angeles.

Universal, which has $293 million in assets, earned $2.5 million last year and $49,000 in a slow first quarter this year. It has seven branches stretching from Woodland Hills to Orange.

Chang has money set aside to boost Universal’s capital and spur its growth, a source close to the transaction said. Holmes said Chang, who will become chairman, will devote more effort toward developing the S&L;’s branches in Rosemead and Eagle Rock, which have large Chinese populations.

The owner, however, will be a passive investor and will keep the thrift’s headquarters in Orange, he said.

The new president will be Lee B. Hagerson, sources said. Hagerson was president of Westmark Savings Bank in Newport Beach, now Sherman Oaks Savings Bank in Sherman Oaks, for about 15 months ending in the spring of 1988. He was hired by regulators to run the failed Southwest Savings & Loan in Beverly Hills after they seized it in April, 1989.

Chang founded Tai Lung Plastic Industrial Co., a major Taiwan manufacturing company that exports about 6 million pairs of women’s shoes to the United States annually.

The sale will give Universal’s parent, Unity Corp. Ltd. in Sydney, Australia, about $3 million above the $10.2 million it paid for the thrift in December, 1986.