Walter Investment Management Corp. has yet to release fourth-quarter results, but if its nine-month performance is any indication, it has some major challenges ahead. Through September, the publicly traded nonbank – the nation’s eighth-largest servicer via its Ditech unit – lost $506.9 million, some of it tied to non-cash writedowns on its mortgage servicing rights. But if revenues are any indication of future earnings, investors shouldn’t brace for too much good news in its ...
Staying on top of the multitude of documents involved in the process of originating a mortgage can help lenders avoid regulatory issues and increase returns, according to an analysis by Nationwide Title Clearing. The mortgage research and document-processing service provider detailed a number of issues with the so-called trailing-document process in a recent update to a white paper initially published in 2014. NTC said the white paper on document tracking and organization ...
Mortgage lenders that deliver loans to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgage-backed securities continued to do gradually more business with borrowers with lower credit scores, according to an exclusive new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of MBS data. In 2016, 21.4 percent of purchase mortgages securitized by the two government-sponsored enterprises had credit scores ranging from 620 to 699. That was up from 20.6 percent in 2015 and 20.5 percent ... [Includes two data charts]
Lenders looking for originations as interest rates increase will likely have to put an emphasis on purchase mortgages. Seasoned loan originators with a track record of purchase-mortgage volume can help with that strategy, though retaining such LOs can be difficult because they are in demand. Matt Lind, a senior partner at Strategic Mortgage Finance Group, an advisory firm, noted that LOs often switch lenders, lured by incentives and higher compensation. He said nearly 60 percent of ...
The need to preserve liquidity and transparency in the existing to-be-announced market was an important component of the Mortgage Bankers Association’s newly-released plan for housing finance reform, according to Deutsche Bank Securities. Jeana Curro, research analyst with Deutsche, said a handful of provisions in the MBA’s latest proposal stand out as improvements from the industry group’s previous ideas on how to reform Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. She agreed...
Analysts at DBRS anticipate some notable changes in the residential mortgage securitization market this year, mostly as a result of expected higher interest rates. “Despite a healthy housing market recovery, post-crisis non-agency RMBS issuance has remained stagnant for several reasons,” said Quincy Tang, managing director of RMBS structured finance, in a new research report issued early this week. In addition to the dominance of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and bank balance-sheet capacity, “a persistently low interest rate environment has rendered...
The average daily trading volume in agency MBS increased to $229.8 billion during January, the second best reading of the past year, and a sign that liquidity is improving, thanks in part to higher interest rates. According to figures compiled by the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, the January reading was better than the daily trading averages posted for the past four years, which ranged from a low of $178.0 billion in 2014 to a high of $222.8 billion in 2013. Agency trading volumes peaked...
Industry observers and groups expressed support this week for President Trump’s move to put the Dodd-Frank Act under the microscope, with an eye toward scaling back its regulatory burden and possibly replacing at least parts of it with more pro-market reforms. Late last week, Trump signed an executive order that directs the Treasury secretary to consult with the heads of the agencies that comprise the Financial Stability Oversight Council, review the current regulatory structure for the U.S. financial system, and report back in 120 days. The order also lays...
Only 69.1 percent of home mortgages originated in 2016 wound up in agency or non-agency MBS issued last year, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis. It was the second-lowest annual mortgage-securitization rate on record, and the third year in a row that the rate failed to reach the 70.0 percent mark. The low securitization rate mostly results from the fact that relatively few jumbo mortgages get out of bank portfolios and into the non-agency MBS market. According to Inside Mortgage Finance estimates, some $381.0 billion of jumbo mortgages were originated...[Includes one data table]
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