Community development financial institutions are feeling left out in the cold when it comes to joining the Federal Home Loan Bank system due to stricter collateral requirements. These nondepository CDFIs, which provide credit and financial services to underserved communities, represented less than six percent of FHLB members as of the end of the year, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office. This translates to 30 members out of the 522 CDFIs nationwide.Treasury-certified non depository CDFIs were permitted to become members in 2008, allowing CDFIs to use their current loan portfolio to raise cash and originate new loans. The GAO performed an analysis of CDFI membership rates after being asked to review the FHLBanks’ implementation of the Housing and Economic Recovery Act provisions.

As mortgage insurers rally around the call for expanded risk sharing, the Federal Housing Finance Agency confirmed this week that it’s exploring the possibility of pilot testing risk-sharing through deeper mortgage insurance coverage. The U.S. Mortgage Insurers trade group said that deeper MI coverage would reduce risks to taxpayers while allowing the GSEs to lower their fees. “And with lower GSE fees, this approach would reduce costs to borrowers. In addition, MI can be used to provide front-end risk sharing on loans with down payments greater than 20 percent,” it said. A prudently underwritten 5 percent down payment loan with MI actually reduces taxpayer exposure below a comparable 20 percent down payment loan without MI, according...

With just six months lefts to meet the new private mortgage insurer eligibility requirements, Genworth U.S. Mortgage Insurance is making moves to ensure it will be in compliance by the end of the year. “We did disclose a gap of $500 to $700 million, but at the same time we said we will fulfill that gap with a combination of reinsurance and cash. We are working at a very aggressive pace to make sure that we meet that standard sooner than later,” said Rohit Gupta, Genworth’s president and CEO. In addition to reinsurance and working on payment plans, Rohit said last month the company sold 14 percent of its Australian mortgage insurance business on the Australian...

After a pilot jumbo mortgage loan program between the Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago and Redwood Trust kicked off this quarter and expanded into a full roll-out beginning June 1, it was announced this week that the loan limit will just about double. The new single-family loan limit for the Mortgage Partnership Finance Direct program will increase from the current $729,750 to $1.5 million in the third quarter. The MPF Direct loan limit was raised primarily to help members that operate in urban or other areas where home prices are higher than the national average, said John Stocchetti, an executive vice president at the FHLB Chicago and group head of the MPF program.

For the first time, individual shareholders have brought a suit against the Federal Housing Finance Agency alleging that the Treasury profit sweep was illegal and accused the agency of violating the Housing and Economic Recovery Act. The May lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for Northern Iowa by three individual shareholders who owned stock in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac prior to the Third Amendment.Thomas Saxton owns shares in the Z series of Freddie preferred stock and he owns shares of Freddie common stock with Ida Saxton.The pair own common stock both jointly and individually and acquired their shares in 2008. The third plaintiff is Bradely Payner, who owns shares of Fannie common stock.

The Federal Home Loan Bank of Des Moines and Federal Home Loan Bank of Seattle completed their merger June 1, the first time in 80 years that two regional banks have combined forces. The combined banks will operate under the Federal Home Loan Bank of Des Moines name and as a result of the voluntary merger, it will become the largest bank in the FHLB system geographically and membership wise, serving close to 1,500 institutions in 13 states and three U.S. Pacific territories. While the FHLB Des Moines had 1,156 members and $95.5 billion in assets as of Dec. 31, 2014, the FHLB Seattle had 316 members and had $35.1 billion in assets as of the end of 2014.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro and Rep. Ed Royce, R-CA, agree that housing reform needs to happen, but while Royce emphasized the need to get private capital back in the system, Castro focused on the issue of credit access. Royce and Castro were speakers during a June 3 housing finance forum in Washington sponsored by the National Journal. Castro said part of the challenge for Democrats and Republicans in both Houses is the issue of access to credit. “How do you ensure that in the system there’s a good amount of access of credit to people of moderate means just like people of strong means,” said Castro.

Household debt has increased since mid-2013 at a faster rate than income, prompting concerns among some industry analysts. DBRS noted that while job market trends are likely to remain favorable, borrowers’ performance across many asset classes is expected to weaken in the next 12 months. According to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, household debt peaked in the fourth quarter of 2008 at $12.67 trillion. The debt measurement, which includes mortgages, student loans, auto loans, credit cards and other borrowing, fell to $11.15 trillion in the second quarter of 2013.

For a company that was on the brink of death seven years ago, Impac Mortgage Holdings is back and ready to take market share. In the first quarter of 2015, the California-based company reported a profit of $34.0 million, reversing a 4Q14 loss of $2.2 million and a $3.0 million loss from a year ago. Impac attributed the improved earnings to higher mortgage origination volume and the recognition of $24.4 million of deferred tax assets offset by losses on ...

The supply of mortgage warehouse credit available in the market has grown as new players entered a field with subdued production through most of 2014, but usage rates have begun to climb. The amount of outstanding borrowing by mortgage lenders has increased by 150 percent over the past year, said Stanley Street, president of Street Resource Group, in a recent interview with Inside Mortgage Trends. His firm provides a software platform for warehouse lenders ...