With mortgage originations expected to be relatively flat in the new year, one might think it would be a buyer’s market for mortgage companies. But not so, according to investment bankers interviewed by Inside Mortgage Trends. “There are far more buyers than sellers at this point in time,” said Larry Charbonneau, a principal in Charbonneau & Associates. Attending a recent trade show catering to independent mortgage banking firms, Charbonneau said he was approached by ...
Mortgage hiring should be somewhat brisk in 2015 as lenders of different sizes plan to expand their sales forces. Prospects are especially positive for mortgage professionals in California, New England, and the Southeast, according to interviews conducted by Inside Mortgage Trends. Quicken Loans, the nation’s largest nonbank originator, hopes to hire approximately 500 new employees in the coming year, including loan officers and underwriters, said company spokesman Chris Smith ...
After agreeing to a $150 million settlement with the New York Department of Financial Services, Ocwen Financial said the company will shift its business strategy away from owning mortgage servicing rights for agency mortgages. In a call with investors in late December, Ronald Faris, Ocwen’s president and CEO, said the nonbank is positioned for “disciplined growth” in the future. “We continue to believe that we have attractive opportunities for earnings growth,” he said. In the past three years ...
Offering “portable” mortgages could increase the potential for homeownership by eliminating the “resetting of the clock” that occurs every time a borrower moves, according to Jeffrey Lubell, director of housing and community initiatives at Abt Associates. A portable mortgage allows a borrower to keep his or her mortgage even if he moves to a different property, helping to build equity. The loans are available in Canada and Europe but haven’t caught on in the U.S. “Few policies would ...
Most of the mortgage fraud investigations in 2013 that involved industry professionals were about misrepresentations on loan documents, evidence that the market remains fertile for fraud, according to a new LexisNexis report. Focusing on proven incidences of fraud, the report found that the share of loans investigated in 2013 for misrepresentation on the credit report, credit history or references rose to 17 percent from 5 percent in 2012. Notably, property valuation fraud ...
Commercial banks and thrifts sold some $175.6 billion of home mortgages during the third quarter of 2014, a healthy 25.4 percent increase from the prior quarter, according to a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of call-report data. Despite the bump in loan sales and mortgage originations, the banking industry reported a modest 4.9 percent drop in mortgage-banking income during the third quarter. And there was relatively little left in the tank as the market ... [Includes one data chart]
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac reported further declines in repurchase activity during the third quarter of 2014, according to a new Inside The GSEs analysis of disclosure reports filed by the enterprises with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Mortgage seller repurchases and indemnifications totaled just $543.1 million during the third quarter, a decline of 68.7 percent from the previous three-month period. It was the lowest quarterly repurchase volume since ... [Includes one data chart]
The Congressional Budget Office in December opened a new approach to GSE reform that could become a middle ground between GOP hardliners who want to entomb Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and lawmakers who want to keep some form of the current system. One way to reduce the GSEs’ footprint in the mortgage market would be to auction a limited supply of Fannie and Freddie mortgage-backed securities guarantees to the highest bidders, the CBO suggested ...
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