LoanDepot has announced a key FHA disaster-related mortgage loan product to help families whose homes have been damaged or destroyed by hurricanes Harvey and Irma. Loans made through the FHA 203(h) Mortgage Insurance for Disaster Victims program are designed specifically for hard-hit homeowners in presidentially-declared major disaster areas (PDMDA) and can be used in tandem with a similar FHA product, the 203(k) property rehabilitation loan. Use of the 203(h) product spiked...

The mortgage servicing market maintained its steady growth pattern during the second quarter of 2017, inching up 0.7 percent to $10.430 trillion, according to new Federal Reserve data. That was the biggest number for mortgage debt outstanding since the first quarter of 2011, when the market stood at $10.439 trillion. Most of the growth has been in Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae servicing but portfolio holdings of whole loans are also on the upswing. There was...[Includes two data tables]

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has asked its internal watchdog to make some “minor adjustments” to its recommendations following recent audit findings of inadequate HUD monitoring of servicers’ loss mitigation activities. Commenting on the HUD Inspector General’s report, HUD asked for some minor tweaks so that it can best implement the IG’s recommended changes, which include revisions in the department’s monitoring policies and procedures, development of new policies and procedures for sharing new information, and indemnification and administrative actions. The IG undertook...

Federal banking regulators this week formally proposed changes to capital rules that would give smaller institutions more leeway to hold mortgage-servicing rights. Current rules require banks to take capital deductions for any MSR holdings that exceed 10 percent of tier 1 capital. Some say this requirement has contributed to the banking industry’s retreat from the mortgage servicing business. The proposal would raise...

Keep in mind that Mel Watt’s term as Federal Housing Finance Agency director expires in January 2019...

Subservicers handle 19.0 percent of all homes mortgages in the U.S., Inside Mortgage Finance found…

Freddie Mac: “We are also specifying that an unlicensed or trainee (or similar classification) appraiser may perform a completion report…”

Overall, there are 500,000 mortgage properties on the island, according to Black Knight…

So far, speculation regarding a change in the GSE dividend payment has been dead wrong, but there’s still time...

In the past, some in the mainstream media have referred to nonbank mortgage lenders as “shadow” lenders, a phrase that residential finance professionals find pejorative…