Mortgage insurance companies reported they expect to be in compliance with updates to private MI eligibility requirements for doing business with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that were released late last week. The final version of PMIERs 2.0 will take effect on March 31, 2019, and analysts agree that other than a few tweaks, they aren’t terribly different than the original proposal. Since 2015, the U.S. Mortgage Insurers said, PMIERs have nearly doubled the amount of capital each mortgage insurer ...

When the going gets tough in the mortgage industry and profit margins begin to wither, thinly capitalized lenders start heading for the exits. But of late, the selling has been light, with a few large blockbuster deals – Ditech and loanDepot – remaining in the “maybe” column. “There’s a lot of chatter out there, but not much in the way of done-deals,” said Chuck Klein, managing partner of Mortgage Banking Solutions, Austin, TX. “But companies are concerned – they’re looking at the next 24 months and ...

The industry is still waiting for guidance on how mortgage-related rules were changed by the Dodd-Frank regulatory relief bill, even though most provisions took effect immediately when the bill was signed into law in May. A number of requirements were changed in regard to smaller financial institutions by the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, including the qualified-mortgage standard. However, the industry is still awaiting guidance from the Consumer Financial ...

Lenders expressed support for the FHA’s new interim policy requiring a second appraisal for home-equity conversion mortgages when the initial property valuation may be inflated. The new appraisal policy for HECMs took effect on Oct. 1 and will be in place through Sept. 1, 2019. FHA will review the policy to determine whether to renew it beyond fiscal year 2019, said FHA Commissioner Brian Montgomery during a press briefing this week. FHA will perform a collateral risk assessment of ...

With just three months left in Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mel Watt’s term, it’s still uncertain whether he will ride out his appointment until January 6 as planned or resign because of sexual harassment allegations. Last week during a House Financial Services Committee hearing, lawmakers heard from both Watt and his accuser, Simone Grimes, about harassment that she said began in 2015. At the hearing, Watt fought back against the allegations and questioned the committee’s ...

Observers say the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has changed its approach in fighting against lending discrimination under a new fair lending chief who has recently drawn heavy criticism for his controversial comments. “In the recent past, [the CFPB is] probably more supervision-oriented than enforcement action-oriented,” said Marshall Bell, a partner at Buckley Sandler, who advises companies on fair lending enforcement actions by the CFPB. “There has been a greater ...

The major driver was a 16.8 percent jump in Fannie Mae issuance…

This executive, like many interviewed, called it an example of charter creep. Freddie and the FHFA think otherwise…

Federal regulators have changed their tone under President Trump, according to participants in the MBS and ABS markets.

As a result, the nonbank share of new production edged up to 53.9 percent, its highest level since the second quarter of 2017.