Freddie Mac failed to meet all of its goals aimed at lending to low-income homebuyers in 2014, according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s preliminary annual housing report, and Rep. Bob Menendez, D-NJ, ranking member of the Senate Subcommittee on Housing, Transportation and Community Development, wants to know why those particular home-purchase goals went unmet. The FHFA sets annual affordability goals for the two government-sponsored ...

Trade groups representing participants in the primary mortgage market and the non-agency mortgage-backed security market are calling on federal banking regulators to address state laws that allow for “super-priority” status for homeowners’ association liens. Risks from HOA super-priority liens have been of particular concern following a September 2014 ruling by the Nevada Supreme Court. The court allowed for a homeowners’ association foreclosure sale to ...

Seven years after the financial crisis that nearly devastated the U.S. economy, the mortgage finance industry finds itself in a far better place than before the crisis but facing new challenges brought on by a tighter credit box and new regulations, according to panelists at a housing symposium late last week in Washington, DC. Hosted by the Urban Institute and CoreLogic, the forum assessed the progress of the mortgage financing industry since the financial crisis abated ...

The Federal Housing Finance Agency announced that the baseline conforming-loan limit will remain at $417,000 in 2016. As of the third quarter of 2015, the house-price index used to make adjustments in the conforming-loan limit still had not caught up to the level set back in the third quarter of 2007. However, high-cost loan limits will go up in 39 counties next year, the FHFA said.

Originations of jumbo mortgages declined in the third quarter of 2015 compared with the previous quarter, according to a new ranking and analysis by Inside Nonconforming Markets. A number of lenders continue to loosen underwriting standards and offer favorable pricing in an effort to originate jumbos. An estimated $85.0 billion in jumbo mortgages were originated in the third quarter. While production fell 8.6 percent on a quarterly basis, originations through ... [Includes one data chart]

The first nine months of 2015 have seen a tremendous increase in FHA single-family originations as borrowers took advantage of a 50 basis-point premium reduction implemented earlier this year, according to Inside FHA/VA Lending’s analysis of agency data. Total FHA loan production during the first nine months of 2015 was up a whopping 81.3 percent increase. Data also showed a 13.1 percent increase in the third quarter from the prior quarter. It is hard to imagine that back in February this year, we reported a dismal ending for 2014, where overlays and high-loan costs caused an 8.1 percent decline in FHA endorsements in the fourth quarter and a 36.6 percent drop from 2013. In 2015, FHA fixed-rate originations increased 12.7 percent from the second to the third quarter, and rose 86.0 percent on a year-to-date basis. In 2014, conversion ... [ 2 charts ].

First-lien portfolio holdings continued to increase in the third quarter of 2015, according to a new Inside Nonconforming Markets analysis of bank and thrift call reports. Banks and thrifts held $1.85 trillion in first-lien mortgages in portfolio at the end of September, up 0.3 percent compared with the end of the second quarter and a 2.8 percent increase compared with the third quarter of 2014. Wells Fargo had the largest portfolio at $266.3 billion as of ... [Includes one data chart]

President Obama last week threatened to veto legislation progressing in Congress to provide qualified-mortgage status to loans held in portfolio by depository institutions. Industry analysts suggest that the bill still has a chance at being signed into law, if adjustments are made. The House approved H.R. 1210, the Portfolio Lending and Mortgage Access Act, on a 255-174 vote last week. Similar legislation is under consideration in the Senate. The bill in the House would ...

Delinquencies on subprime mortgages continued to decline in the third quarter of 2015, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. The trade group said the non-seasonally adjusted serious delinquent rate for subprime mortgages hit 12.66 percent at the end of September, the ninth consecutive quarterly decline. The subprime serious delinquent rate was down from 13.40 percent in the second quarter of 2015, 15.52 percent in the third quarter of 2014 and 21.25 percent in ...

Despite FHA’s denial of further mortgage insurance premium reductions any time soon, stakeholders are holding out hope for another cut in the near future. Those supporting the idea of another pricing adjustment say it could open the door wider for more borrowers to use the FHA single-family program and generate the volume needed to offset any potential revenue loss that may result from the reduction. But Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro and his top officials have denied any plans of reducing MIPs. Castro has called such talk “premature,” despite a positive FY 2015 actuarial evaluation of the FHA’s Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund, which some claim could be used to justify another premium reduction. Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Housing and Interim FHA Chief Ed Golding, in a press briefing, said the focus is elsewhere and not on ...