A new report by Fannie Mae finds that second-home mortgage market activity is in the midst of a strong rebound, representing a small yet significant corner of the mortgage market.

ICYMI: Late last week, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released its guide to completing its integrated disclosure forms under the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act and the Truth in Lending Act.

The CFPB plans to launch a pilot project as part of its efforts to improve the mortgage closing process.

The market share for the top five sellers to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac fell to 33.3 percent in the first quarter of 2014.

Ocwen's Bill Erbey sees the positive in recent scrutiny of nonbank servicers.

While mostly associated with investors, a fair share of current homeowners rely on cash for home purchases as a way to avoid the hassles associated with mortgage closings.

The FHA's mortgage insurance premiums could be set to decline at the end of FY 2015.

The sputtering non-agency MBS market generated just $2.59 billion in new issuance during the first three months of 2014, one of the lowest quarterly marks since the market imploded in late 2007. New issuance in the first quarter was down 44.1 percent from the already-weak level in the fourth quarter of 2013, and it was off 65.6 percent from the same period a year ago. There was...[Includes two data charts]

The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs held more than 10 hearings last year in advance of the housing-finance reform bill introduced in March by Sens. Tim Johnson, D-SD, and Mike Crapo, R-ID. However, the bill appears to be far from perfect, as industry participants are angling to make suggestions for changes as the committee plans a markup at the end of this month. Perhaps the biggest outstanding issue with S.1217 is that even though the Johnson-Crapo bill calls for the preservation of the to-be-announced market, the capital-markets execution contemplated under the new housing-finance system might not be compatible with TBA transactions. The Johnson-Crapo version of S. 1217 doesn’t have...

Issuance of residential MBS from foreign countries aimed at investors in the U.S. dwindled in 2013 after a few years when it surpassed new issuance of domestic jumbo deals. Activity in the market for U.S. dollar-denominated foreign MBS has picked up somewhat this year due to issuance out of Australia. Some $1.63 billion in U.S. dollar-denominated foreign residential MBS was issued in 2013, according to the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, a significant decline from the $10.70 billion in such issuance in 2012. The market for foreign residential MBS aimed at U.S. investors has been strong since the end of 2009, with $21.10 billion in such issuance in 2010 and $32.68 billion in issuance in 2011. After the financial crisis, issuance of U.S. dollar-denominated foreign MBS outpaced...