“Tough-love” counseling for borrowers can curb re-defaults by looking critically at how all forms of spending affect a person’s ability to pay off mortgage and credit card debt, according to a subservicer that uses this approach. “Dollars are in competition when a family is in trouble,” said Stephen Stack, managing director of Outreach Financial Services. “There is a struggle between paying different creditors, and holistic counseling helps redistribute the money in the best way.” Holistic financial counseling looks at a borrower’s entire spending pattern – from mortgage to credit card to...

Agency residential MBS issuance in November rose to its busiest level since the start of 2011, but seasonal slowdowns in housing activity and a refinance boom that’s losing steam suggest that the current wave is at or near its peak. Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae generated a total of $114.53 billion in new single-family MBS during November. That was up 11.2 percent from October volume and marked the highest monthly production level since January 2011, when the agencies issued $137.76 billion. But consumer demand for refinance loans has been...(Includes two data charts)

Industry experts and trade groups said this week they were generally supportive of a House Republican bill to create a new non-agency residential MBS market, but they still want the government to have a role, however limited, in the final product. The Private Mortgage Market Investment Act, drafted but not yet filed by Rep. Scott Garrett, R-NJ, would create a heavily regulated MBS market made up solely of private entities that would function with no federal guarantee at all. Garrett, who chairs the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets and Government...

Federal financial regulators are still sifting through stacks of criticism about their controversial risk-retention proposal for the MBS and ABS market and have not yet decided whether to start over again with a new proposed rule, as most industry groups have urged them to do. The agencies are also getting a lot of push from Capitol Hill to re-think the original proposal, which was released in late March. “I am very concerned that if the qualified residential mortgage definition being worked out by regulators isn’t broad enough, it could hurt the housing market, especially...

Lawmakers and experts reviewing a proposed bill that seeks to drastically overhaul the secondary mortgage market without the need for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac question whether the Federal Housing Finance Agency is the most appropriate choice to implement key components of the program.The Private Mortgage Market Investment Act, drafted but not yet filed by Rep. Scott Garrett, R-NJ, would create a heavily regulated mortgage-backed securities market made up solely of private entities that would function with no federal guarantee at all.

Debt issuance for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Home Loan Banks all recorded increases in new debt issuance during the third quarter of 2011.The three GSEs collectively issued $797.7 billion in new debt issue during the third quarter, a 9.8 percent increase from the previous quarter, while GSE debt outstanding at $2.152 trillion declined 4.8 percent from the second quarter.

Just in time for the holidays, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac each announced last week that all foreclosure-related evictions from occupied single-family and two-to-four unit properties with Fannie or Freddie mortgages will be suspended from Dec. 19, 2011 to Jan. 2, 2012.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would be put into “irrevocable receivership” with the Federal Housing Finance Agency tasked as their receiver no later than 18 months after enactment of a bill introduced in the Senate this week.Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-GA, introduced the Mortgage Finance Act of 2011 to “get the American taxpayer out of the business of bailing out the mortgage industry.” The bill would wind down Fannie and Freddie while creating a new regulatory framework for “high-quality” mortgage securitization for both single-family and multifamily mortgages.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency needs to be much more hands-on and engaged in its oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, according to the Finance Agency’s official watchdog.The FHFA Office of Inspector General’s conclusion is not new, but the OIG doubled down on its criticism of the agency last week both in its Semiannual Report to Congress and in written testimony submitted to the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations.

The CEOs of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac told lawmakers last week they have been working to manage all expenses prudently at the taxpayer-subsidized government-sponsored enterprises even as they sought to explain away reports that the two GSEs ran up a six-figure bill attending an industry convention in Chicago in October.Testifying before the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Fannie CEO Michael Williams and Freddie CEO Charles Haldeman noted the GSEs’ importance in the current and future mortgage markets even as they cited their efforts to reduce overall expenses through money-saving cuts and improvements in operational efficiency over the last three years.