Despite a late surge in refinance business for seriously underwater home mortgages, new business volume at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac declined by 10.2 percent during the second quarter, according to a new Inside Mortgage Finance analysis and ranking. The two government-sponsored enterprises securitized a total of $273.95 billion of conventional single-family mortgages during the second quarter. Thanks to the huge $305.21 billion of GSE business recorded during the first three months of 2012, the market was still 39.3 percent ahead of the pace set during the first half of last year. Refinance activity...

Members of Congress from both sides of the political divide remain concerned about the cost of real estate appraisals and consumer access to the people who perform them, as well as the overall effectiveness of the regulatory regime that oversees it all. “I believe that the appraisal process is absolutely essential and so important to the mortgage process because we know a sound regulatory structure in which the industry can operate and serve the consumer is of prime importance,” said Rep. Shelly Moore Capito, R-WV, during a hearing this week of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Insurance, Housing and Community Opportunity. Capito is questioning whether the Appraisal Subcommittee of the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council can...

In the era of new consumer protection laws and the emergence of the Consumer Financial Protection Board, many community banks and independent mortgage lenders find themselves stuck in a morass of confusing regulations and guidance, concerned whether they can pass a tough CFPB audit. While these financial institutions have been through regulatory audits before, they have not been confronted by a government audit the size and scope of a CFPB compliance examination. The biggest concerns are whether their compliance process is up to CFPB standards, whether compliance is properly and adequately documented, and whether...

Homeowners who received foreclosure counseling through the federally funded National Foreclosure Mitigation Counseling program obtained loan modifications that resulted in significantly lower monthly mortgage payments than they would have received without counseling, according to NeighborWorks America. The program has helped reduce borrowers’ monthly payments on their homes by an average of $2,100 in annual savings for each counseled homeowner. This represented more than $372 million in annual savings to homeowners who received...

The disparate impact theory of racial discrimination and the question of whether such claims can be brought under the Fair Housing Act have once again been brought to the doorstep of the Supreme Court of the United States. The case pits Mount Holly, NJ, against a citizens group that says the town’s redevelopment plan for their neighborhood would have a disparate impact on the mostly minority population of the area. The town prevailed in state court and in federal district court, but the Third Circuit appeals court ruled...

For Chicago’s Cole Taylor Bank, what a difference a year makes. Last week, Taylor Capital Group, the $4.7 billion holding company of Cole Taylor Bank, announced a major expansion of the bank’s retail mortgage unit with the hiring of 60 loan officers. The expansion will nearly double the number of Cole Taylor Mortgage retail origination offices and represents...

Mortgage banking profits on loan origination soared in early 2012, while servicing operations edged into profitability, according to the latest average performance data reported this week by the Mortgage Bankers Association. The average firm participating in the MBA survey reported $2.027 million in net income after adjustments during the first quarter. That was up 68.9 percent from the fourth quarter and more than four times the average profit earned...

Well over half of the mortgage repurchase activity reported by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during the first quarter of 2012 was still pending or being disputed by lenders, according to a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of disclosures made by the two government-sponsored enterprises. Mortgage lenders repurchased a total of $2.37 billion of loans because of representation and warranty problems during the first three months of the year, the GSE disclosures indicate. The repurchase amount represents the principal balance of the loans resolved through a repurchase, although...(Includes two data charts)

The Federal Housing Finance Agency last week finalized a rule which establishes prudential standards relating to the management and operations of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Home Loan Banks. The Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008 requires the FHFA director to establish standards that address 10 separate areas relating to the management and operation of the GSEs and FHLBanks and authorizes the director to establish the standards by regulation or by guideline.

Fannie Mae’s and Freddie Mac’s home retention activity declined for the most part during the first quarter of 2012, according to a new analysis of Federal Housing Finance Agency data by Inside The GSEs. Total loss mitigation activity – total home retention efforts and foreclosure alternatives combined – declined 5.0 percent during the first quarter of the year to 214,812 and was down 14.3 percent from year-ago levels. Our analysis was based on the FHFA’s First Quarter 2012 Foreclosure Prevention Report. Total home retention efforts came to 111,739 at the end of the first quarter, a decrease of 7.4 percent from the fourth quarter 2011 and down 22.4 percent from the same period a year before.