The House Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation, Housing and Urban Development this week approved a fiscal 2016 HUD appropriations bill, with language that would bar FHA, Ginnie Mae or HUD from deploying federal funds to foster the use of eminent domain to seize mortgages. “None of the funds made available in this act shall be used by [the three agencies] to insure, securitize or establish a federal guarantee of any mortgage or MBS that refinances or otherwise replaces a mortgage that has been subject to eminent domain condemnation or seizure, by a state, municipality or any other political subdivision of a state,” states Section 229 of the legislation. The Structured Finance Industry Group said...

Freddie Mac announced this week that it has securitized more than $100 billion in multifamily mortgages through its K-Deal program, a milestone for the initiative that was launched in 2009. K-Deals were introduced during the financial crisis when the CMBS market collapsed. Freddie created the program to help revive the market, but it had to convince lenders that selling a loan via securitization was better than selling a loan that Freddie would hold in its portfolio. “In 2008, when we first started talking to investors about doing a CMBS-style securitization, some of them thought...

“I am not satisfied with only making $34 million in the quarter,” said Ocwen CEO Ron Faris. “We intend to do better.”

A foreclosure case involving a mortgage pooled in a 2007 non-agency MBS has prompted competing amicus briefs from the Structured Finance Industry Group and California’s attorney general, among others. Yvanova v. New Century Mortgage is under consideration by California’s Supreme Court. The case hinges on whether a borrower can challenge a foreclosure based on a pooling and servicing agreement. The lower court previously ruled in favor of the lender, New Century Mortgage. “SFIG is...

New lenders that specialize in loans that don’t meet the government’s qualified-mortgage standards continue to draw up blueprints and raise capital – or at least try to – but very few of them are banking on securitization as a take-out strategy. However, all that may change with the launch of LendSure Financial Services, a San Diego startup headed by a handful of veterans from the subprime industry of yesteryear, including Jim Konrath, Stu Marvin and Joe Lydon. According to one non-agency investor briefed on LendSure’s plans, securitization is...

New capital requirements for private mortgage insurers are a positive for the industry and should not cause a big change in MI premiums, high loan-to-value prepayments or net issuance of conventional MBS, according to a new analysis from Barclays Research. The reason for analysts’ optimism is that the effective rate for conventional conforming mortgages with private MI has been more attractive than on an FHA loan for borrowers with FICO scores above 700 and original LTVs of 80-95 percent. The opposite has been true for borrowers with low FICO scores. Consequently, issuance of conventional loans over the past year has largely favored...

But a poll by JPMorgan Chase found that 30 percent of potential homebuyers said they plan to purchase a home in the next 18 months.

A total of $49.55 billion of commercial mortgages were securitized during the first quarter of 2015, virtually unchanged from the fourth quarter of last year, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis. But the private CMBS market recorded a significant increase in new issuance. Non-agency CMBS production climbed 31.3 percent from the fourth quarter to hit $30.91 billion, the second-highest three-month output since the financial crisis shut down new issuance in the second quarter of 2008. Compared to the first quarter of 2014, new issuance was up 74.3 percent. The jump in private CMBS issuance helped offset...[Includes one data chart]

The jump in private CMBS issuance helped offset what looks like a sharp slowdown in agency multifamily MBS production.

Mortgage lenders originated an estimated $360.0 billion of first-lien home loans during the first three months of 2015, lifting the market to its strongest quarterly volume since the third quarter of 2013, according to a new Inside Mortgage Finance analysis and ranking. The first-quarter total originations estimate does not include home-equity lending, which many lenders consider a separate business from traditional mortgage lending. In the past, Inside Mortgage Finance included home-equity in total originations, and those market estimates are not being revised. In 2014, about 5.7 percent of total originations ($71.0 billion) were home-equity loans. A number of survey participants have reported...[Includes two data charts]