A local mortgage processor said it plans to hire as many as 1,100 workers over the next three years, in jobs ranging from paralegal and customer service to real estate and technical services.

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National Real Estate Information Services President Michael Forgas yesterday said the new jobs would all pay well above the minimum wage. He said the Kennedy-based firm is expanding to accommodate robust home sales and refinancing activity, which are expected to remain strong despite rising interest rates.

The 14-year-old firm, which provides title, appraisal, credit check and other real estate-related services, already employs more than 700, including 300 added the past few months. It chose to expand here, Forgas said, because of a growing cluster of related mortgage firms that service housing markets around the country. Moon mortgage processor Lender's Service, for example, last year said it expected to hire from 600 to 1,000 employees.

NREIS received $3.2 million in incentives from state officials, who were on hand yesterday at the former GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare headquarters for the company's announcement of its plans. The company said it would invest an additional $8.8 million to add jobs at the former Glaxo unit's headquarters in Kennedy, which it purchased last year for $3.85 million. With renovations on the building near completion, NREIS Chairman Richard Hvizdak said some employees have begun to settle in the facility, a quarter mile from its current headquarters on Bilmar Drive.

Flanked at a press conference by Forgas, Hvizdak and Allegheny County Chief Executive Dan Onorato, state Secretary of Community and Economic Development Dennis Yablonsky said the real estate service company's growth was in line with the state's economic development strategy.

Citing sobering job and population growth statistics for Allegheny County, Yablonsky said that economic growth in the region and in Pennsylvania will occur by stopping the "bleeding in the manufacturing sector" and focusing on "new small niche companies'' such as NREIS.

State and county officials have been negotiating the financial package with NREIS since last fall. It includes $2.2 million in job creation tax credits, which provide companies credits up to $1,000 for each job created, and a $500,000 grant to assist with expansion.

An additional $497,250 job-training grant will fund on-site job training for NREIS employees provided by Slippery Rock University. "Folks don't need a college education to come and work at National Real Estate, they can come with high school or post-high school level training," Yablonsky said.

NREIS officials said they never seriously considered relocating their headquarters in the absence of the state's financial assistance, citing a desire to be near other mortgage service firms in the region. "Naturally our focus was really here because we had our base here," said Forgas.

Forgas was not specific about the types of jobs NREIS would create, saying only that they would pay ''significantly higher" than minimum wage. "We can present the opportunity for people to really develop and make themselves into a career and make significant money," he said. "It's up to the individual."