Redwood Trust could boost its jumbo acquisitions by $5.0 billion a year, according to industry analysts, due to a new partnership with the Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago. The real estate investment trust announced last week that it has an exclusive three-year deal to purchase “high balance” mortgages from FHLBank members participating in a new product under the Mortgage Partnership Finance Program. Under the new MPF Direct, members of an ...

In December, the Federal Housing Finance Agency was set to increase the guaranty fees charged by the government-sponsored enterprises. However, Melvin Watt, the new director of the FHFA, put a hold on the planned g-fee increase and is taking a much more deliberate look at the fees, including a potential decrease in g-fees. The FHFA this month released a request for input regarding the g-fees charged by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, including questions about ...

Delinquencies on the $347 million jumbo mortgage-backed security Redwood Trust issued in April spiked recently to 3.37 percent. That’s the highest delinquency rate seen on any jumbo MBS issued since 2010. However, Fitch Ratings said the spike was an aberration, caused by a servicing transfer, not sudden poor performance by pristine jumbo borrowers. “Early delinquency related to servicing transfers in recent residential MBS is typically due to ...

AmeriHome Mortgage plans to offer non-agency correspondent mortgages with debt-to-income ratios as high as 55 percent beginning in the fourth quarter of 2014, according to officials at the nonbank. The lender was sold by Impac Mortgage Holdings earlier this year and is now headed by James Furash, the former head of the banking unit at Countrywide Financial. In July, AmeriHome plans to start offering a 5/1 adjustable-rate mortgage with ... [Includes five briefs]

SunTrust Mortgage’s recent settlement of a dispute with the federal government and 49 state attorneys general over defective FHA loans and Wells Fargo’s losing bid to quash a similar lawsuit are raising concerns about doing business with the FHA. Industry attorneys say the lesson for lenders in these recent industry debacles is that it is “extraordinarily dangerous” to do FHA loans these days given the outcome of the two cases. It is also getting harder to trust mortgage settlement agreements with the government, they added. “The scariest part in all these is the combination of government forces involved in these claims – state AGs, Department of Justice, Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau,” said an attorney, who worked on both cases. “When they want to get you, they can get you.” Others believe these developments could have a ...

Two federal agencies have announced separate actions to protect reverse mortgage borrowers and rural home purchasers from deceptive advertising and marketing. This week, the FHA warned lenders participating in the Home Equity Conversion Mortgage program not to use misleading or deceptive language in marketing FHA-insured reverse mortgages to consumers. The FHA said the guidance is intended to protect HECM borrowers from advertising and presentations that appear to limit their options rather than informing them of the full range of available HECM products. Underscoring senior borrowers’ “freedom of choice,” FHA Commissioner Carol Galante said the agency wants lenders to know their marketing and advertising practices are under constant surveillance to prevent customers from being steered to unsuitable reverse mortgage products. Galante noted the ...

Barring any unpleasant news, Julian Castro, President Obama’s nominee for secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, apparently has passed his job interview with the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee. This week, Castro, a three-term mayor of San Antonio, TX, laid out his priorities as HUD secretary before committee members if he is confirmed for the job. Castro underscored the importance of “partnership and pragmatism” as the key drivers in running a city. As HUD secretary, Castro said he would enhance “cross-agency collaboration” and emphasize the value of “measuring results” by setting precise goals, consulting with the public on major issues, developing a public report card and annual updates – tools he employed in his municipal housing education and affordable housing initiatives in San Antonio. As mayor, Castro worked to ...

The FHA’s proposed supplemental method for measuring lender performance is “a step in the right direction” and would help compare lenders to an FHA acceptable rate, rather than an industry average, according to the National Association of Realtors. The supplemental performance metric is crucial in an environment where lenders are instituting credit overlays on FHA-insured mortgages, the NAR said in a comment letter. The FHA proposes to use the metric along with the compare ratio to determine whether a lender with an unusually high default rate should be terminated from the FHA single-family program. This reflects the FHA’s view that factors other than the compare ratio might also influence a lender’s performance. Currently, the FHA compares a lender’s early seriously delinquent (SDQ) performance in a geographic area to other lenders in the same area. The number derived from this ...

The FHA’s Homeowners Armed With Knowledge (HAWK) pilot program is getting strong public support, particularly from first-time homebuyers and housing counselors.Based on comments received by the Department of Housing and Urban Development so far, the HAWK pilot is already taking hold in the public’s mind despite its limited publicity. -Rachel Andreyo, a new college graduate who was turned down recently for a mortgage loan pre-approval, said HAWK not only would educate potential first-time homebuyers about homeownership but also raise their hope of becoming a homeowner before the age of 30. “The knowledge this program would provide could be a game changer for young people and struggling Americans everywhere,” she wrote. Shawanda Walker, a single mother, sees HAWK as an opportunity for her to learn how to negotiate her first home purchase, learn about property taxes and ...

FHA jumbo loan originations fell significantly in the first quarter of 2014 due primarily to higher mortgage insurance premiums and a decrease in the mortgage loan limits, particularly in high-cost areas of the country, according to Inside FHA Lending’s analysis of agency data. FHA lenders reported a meager $2.4 billion in jumbo originations during the first three months of the year, a decrease of 21.2 percent from the previous quarter and down a whopping 55.7 percent from the same period a year ago. Purchase loans accounted for 81.0 percent of new originations while fixed-rate loans comprised 86.8 percent. FHA jumbo loans are those over $417,000 and they comprise a very small slice of the FHA’s overall loan portfolio. Citing FHA data, Brian Chappelle, a mortgage industry consultant, said that of the FHA loans originated in the last 12 months, roughly 11,000 loans were above $500,000, down from ... [ 2 charts]