In an attempt to cater to more diverse communities and likely drum up more business for its low downpayment program, Freddie Mac unveiled a new mortgage pilot with two lenders last week that loosens eligibility requirements. The program, Your Path, is different in that it is based on certain borrower characteristics and trends. It was launched with two nonbank lenders that specialize in serving the Hispanic community and low-income borrowers. It was announced during the national convention of the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals. New American Funding, headquartered in Dallas, and Las Vegas-based Alterra Home Loans are building on Freddie’s low downpayment Home Possible mortgage platform to create the pilot.
Fannie Mae Names Small Pool Winning Bidder. The Community Loan Fund of New Jersey, Inc., an affiliate of New Jersey Community Capital, a non-profit community development financial institution, is the winning bidder of Fannie Mae’s fifth Community Impact Pool of non-performing loans. The transaction is expected to close on Nov. 22, 2016, and includes 120 loans secured by properties located in the Miami area with an unpaid principal balance of approximately $20.3 million. In collaboration with Wells Fargo Securities, LLC and The Williams Capital Group, L.P., Fannie Mae began marketing this Community Impact Pool to potential bidders on Aug. 10, 2016.
Documents obtained by Inside MBS & ABS reveal that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were required to charge the same “minimum” guaranty fee for single-family guaranty commitments issued on or after Aug. 1. Both government-sponsored enterprises received identical marching orders for minimum g-fees: 44 basis points for 30-year mortgages and 30 bps for 15-year loans. And, according to copies of emails from the Federal Housing Finance Agency following up on the agency’s initial July 29 directive, an unspecified number of Freddie sellers were paying less than the minimum. The names of these sellers were redacted...[Includes one data table]
Money market funds held some $114.16 billion of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac debt as of the end of August, a 3.0 percent increase from the end of last year, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis of data compiled by the Office of Financial Research. But new regulations have spurred a migration from prime money market funds into government funds, said the OFR, a unit of the U.S. Department of Treasury. The shift from prime to government funds reflects new Securities and Exchange Commission rules aimed at making prime funds less vulnerable to investor runs, OFR analysts explained in a recent research brief. Although the new SEC requirements don’t become mandatory until Oct. 14, 2016, fund managers began...[Includes one data table]
As recently as three years ago, few companies were willing to finance originations of nonprime mortgages, either via warehouse funding or acquiring the paper as whole loans. Daniel Perl, CEO of Citadel Servicing, said there are currently a number of Wall Street companies and other firms that will provide a certain amount of liquidity for one to three years, while demand for whole loans and MBS is also increasing. “There’s a lot to be said for this market today that you couldn’t say three years ago,” he said earlier this month during a webinar hosted by Inside Mortgage Finance. Tom Hutchens, a senior vice president of sales and marketing at Angel Oak Mortgage Solutions, said...
A boom in ABS backed by unsecured consumer loans requires closer scrutiny, according to analysts at Fitch Ratings. Marketplace lenders have boosted the issuance of such ABS in recent years, though the rating service warned that deal performance is difficult to predict. “Many firms in this space have legitimate value propositions and apparent technological advantages,” Fitch said. “However, they have yet to prove their underwriting merit.” Since September 2013, at least 31 ABS totaling $4.60 billion backed by consumer loans from marketplace lenders have been issued...