State-licensed mortgage companies – and the agencies that oversee them – are on the verge of receiving the same kind of protections against waivers of privilege for information provided to the CFPB that was previously extended to depository mortgage lenders supervised by federal agencies. Before adjourning for the November elections, the U.S. Senate passed H.R. 5062, the Examination and Supervisory Privilege Parity Act of 2014. The bill would require the CFPB to coordinate its supervisory activities with state agencies that license, supervise or examine those non-depositories that offer consumer financial products or services. It also would provide that when someone shares information with those same state regulators, or with prudential regulators and state banking regulators, that sharing does not waive attorney-client privileges. ...
Before members of Congress left the nation’s capital for their final push before the November elections, diverse efforts were underway for making changes to aspects of the qualified mortgage definition under the CFPB’s ability-to-repay rule, either through legislation or persuasion. Earlier this month, the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 5461, a package of legislation which includes the text of H.R. 3211, the Mortgage Choice Act, which passed the House unanimously in June. The legislation would make it easier for mortgages to fit under the ATR rule’s cap on points and fees by providing equal treatment to title charges, regardless of whether or not a consumer chooses a title company affiliated with the lender. “This provision is narrowly focused to ...
Most of the mortgage finance trade associations wrote to the CFPB recently with a handful of suggestions to improve implementation of the bureau’s TRID – the pending Truth in Lending Act/Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act integrated disclosure rule. At the top of the list: more written guidance, please.“We appreciate the bureau offering oral guidance through webinars and other channels,” said the groups in a joint letter. However, due to the complexity of the rule, “we strongly recommend that the bureau also provide reliable, written guidance on issues.” Such input is “essential for lenders, settlement service providers, insurers, investors and other secondary market entities, regulators and ultimately, consumers themselves.” The groups also encouraged the CFPB to deepen its engagement in industry ...
Representatives of some of the leading lenders of non-qualified mortgages are optimistic about the prospects for the future of the space, seeing opportunity where many see only risk. Brian Simon, chief operating officer for New Penn Financial, answered the question: Why open a non-QM market? “I think, as everyone is aware, the current credit environment has shut out many potential homeowners,” he said during a webinar last week sponsored by Inside Mortgage Finance, an affiliated newsletter. “There’s a narrow credit box in the current mortgage market, which means that the people who were hardest hit in the housing crisis have little access to credit.” New Penn Financial has decided to market products that allow access to affordable credit. “That just ...
Credit history and debt-to-income outpaced collateral as the primary contributors to mortgage application denials in the purchase-loan segment in 2013, according to an analysis by Inside the CFPB of the latest Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data released last week by the CFPB and the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council. It was a much closer horse race in the refinance space, but then again, collateral is always more of an issue for refis. Credit history was identified as the cause of denial for 26.3 percent of applications last year in FHA/VA purchase mortgages, followed by DTI at 23.3 percent, with collateral registering only at 12.4 percent. Things were a little more competitive in the conventional home purchase loan space. There, credit ...
Did Apple Place Itself Within CFPB’s Purview? Some legal experts think the recent rollout of mobile payment technology by Apple Inc. might have put the consumer technology heavyweight in the CFPB’s regulatory crosshairs. Georgetown Law Professor Adam Levitin said in a recent blog that Apple may have unwittingly become a regulated financial institution through the release of its Apple Pay service. “Basically, I think Apple is now a ‘service provider’ for purposes of the Consumer Financial Protection Act, which means Apple is subject to CFPB examination and UDAAP [unfair, deceptive or abusive acts or practices],” he said. Levitin then proceeded to walk readers through a number of legal definitions to bolster his argument. Vivian Kim, an associate at the Dykema ...
At least a dozen or so national lenders – almost all of them nonbanks – have rolled out lending programs for loans that don’t meet the qualified mortgage standard, and none of them expect to issue a mortgage-backed security this year. Moreover, most aren’t so certain they will be able to issue a security next year either, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t thinking about it. New Penn Financial has created...
Demand in the fixed-income markets for Ginnie Mae securities continues to increase at home and abroad as the program’s deep liquidity and explicit government guaranty draw more investors, according to agency officials and MBS issuers. The relatively high proportion of purchase-money loans and first-time buyers helped Ginnie edge past Freddie Mac in recent months in terms of new issuance, noted John Getchis, head of Ginnie’s Office of Capital Markets, during the Ginnie Mae Summit held in Washington, DC, this week. “We saw...
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