According to survey figures from Inside Mortgage Finance, wholesale/broker production accounted for 9.6 percent of fundings in the fourth quarter of 2015...
Freddie Mac has launched a project to correct some “operational deficiencies” in how it transfers money in and out of mortgage-backed securities trusts. The GSE said in its 2015 10-K filing that the issue has not had a material impact on its earnings or on investors in its MBS. Freddie explained that seller/servicers deposit various funds – such as mortgage principal and interest payments owed to MBS investors and guarantee fees due to the GSE – into custodial accounts for securitization trusts. The funds owed to the company are classified as restricted until they are transferred to an operating cash account. Management, however, determined that Freddie has not maintained detailed pool-by-pool records of funds in the custodial account...
The Federal Housing Finance Agency released the 2015 Scorecard progress report for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac on March 3. The agency detailed goals the GSEs met in 2015 and mentioned several initiatives for this year including the first public release of non-performing loan sales data in 2016. Because of the amount of time needed to transfer sold loans to a new servicer, evaluate borrowers for foreclosure prevention action and complete loan modification trial periods, the FHFA said it takes six to 12 months after the datew of an NPL sale to get any meaningful data. Once it has that data, it will begin to assess borrower outcomes of NPL sales going forward.
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are private companies, according to a recent Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals case that dismissed an argument stating that the mortgage giants are federal instrumentalities as it relates to them being liable under the False Claims Act. Now some say this ruling may influence and stir up reaction about a case in Delaware involving GSE shareholders who argue that the Treasury sweep of the GSEs’ profits was illegal. In the United States ex rel. Adams v. Aurora Loan Services, Inc., et al., a whistleblower case, James Adams, on behalf of the government, named 16 banks, lenders and servicers as defendants in a FCA breach of representations-and-warranties lawsuit. It was alleged...
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac single-family business slowed in February as the purchase-mortgage sector faltered, and trends suggest the GSEs are losing share in their core market. The two enterprises issued $50.05 billion of single-family mortgage-backed securities last month, according to a new ranking and analysis by Inside The GSEs. That was down 11.5 percent from January and left Fannie and Freddie production for the first two months of 2015 12.2 percent behind the pace set last year. February’s new issuance was also the lowest monthly total for the GSEs since May 2014, when they produced $44.80 billion of single-family MBS. Purchase-mortgage volume followed seasonal patterns and sank 18.5 percent from...
The five largest mortgage servicers that got into trouble because of their flawed servicing and foreclosure practices have passed their final test for compliance with the 2012 National Mortgage Settlement, according to the Office of Mortgage Settlement Oversight. The OMSO report summarizes a set of five compliance reports filed by NMS Monitor Joseph Smith with the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia for five servicers that were subject to the $25 billion ...
Poor underwriting, rather than the collapse of house prices, more likely caused homeowners to default on their non-agency mortgage loans – a situation that gradually worsened and subsequently caused the country’s worst financial disaster, according to a new report published by University Financial Associates. Subject to a number of caveats, the report’s findings dramatically illustrate the importance of eroding underwriting quality in non-agency mortgage-backed securities ...
As mortgage performance improves, the organization that administers the Homeowner’s Hope Hotline is putting an increased emphasis on helping people qualify for mortgage financing. The Homeownership Preservation Foundation has worked extensively with consumers who suffered problems during the financial crisis but could now be ready to purchase a home. “Boomerang borrowers represent opportunity,” David Berenbaum, the CEO of the Homeownership Preservation Foundation ...
Commercial banks and thrifts continued their years-long retreat from the business of servicing home mortgages for other investors, and some observers are questioning whether nonbanks are strong enough to pick up the slack. As of the end of 2015, banks and thrifts serviced $4.054 trillion of single-family mortgages for other investors, according to a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of call-report data. That was down $84.3 billion, or 2.04 percent ... [Includes one data chart]
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