Fannie Mae late last week notified its lenders that the GSE has modified its requirements for reporting notifications of mortgage insurance revisions, mortgage insurer-initiated cancellations and claim denials.

Freddie Mac late last week issued its own set of servicing guidelines in keeping with its mandate from the Federal Housing Finance Agency that mirror the guidelines that its fellow GSE Fannie Mae released in June.The FHFA’s Servicing Alignment Initiative, announced in late April, requires Fannie and Freddie to align their servicing requirements in four key areas: borrower contact, delinquency management practices, loan modifications and foreclosure timelines.

Freddie Nears Proposed TBW SettlementFreddie Mac and defunct mortgage servicer Taylor, Bean & Whitaker Mortgage Corp. have entered into a proposed settlement that would grant the GSE an unsecured claim of $1.022 billion that mostly represents past and future repurchase claims.The proposed settlement, filed with the Bankruptcy Court for the Middle District of Florida two weeks ago, would result in a distribution between $40 million to $45 million, which is less than the outstanding repurchase requests, according to Freddie Mac’s filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The former chairman and owner of Taylor, Bean & Whitaker was slammed with a 30 year prison sentence and ordered to forfeit approximately $38.5 million for his key role in orchestrating a $2.9 billion fraud scheme that led to the failure of TBW and Colonial bank and counted Freddie Mac as among its victims.

Mortgages modified by Fannie Mae slightly outperformed those modified by Freddie Mac in the short term while Freddie’s loans performed moderately better a year after modification, even as the performance of mortgages serviced by the two GSEs improved during the first three months the year, according to the first quarter Mortgage Metrics report issued by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Office of Thrift Supervision.Fannie loan mods had a 12.5 percent re-default rate three months after modification, while Freddie mods saw a 13.3 percent rate. At the six-month mark, the GSEs tied at 21.4 percent.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac recorded significant declines in the volume of single-family mortgages they securitized during the second quarter of 2011, according to a new analysis and ranking based on the Inside Mortgage Finance GSE MarketScope. The two government-sponsored enterprises generated a combined $155.0 billion in single-family mortgage-backed securities during the second quarter, down a hefty 40.6 percent from the first three months of the year. It was the slowest quarter in Fannie/Freddie MBS output since the final three months of 2008, the low ... [includes 3 data charts]

The Department of the Treasury and state banking regulators strenuously objected to a proposed rule issued by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency regarding federal preemption of state consumer financial law even as calls to withdraw the proposal or reopen its comment period mounted. As the comment period ended June 27, the Treasury Department responded unfavorably to the preemption rule proposed by one of its own bureaus, saying that the agency’s approach is incompatible with the federal preemption text of the Dodd-Frank Act and its ...

The new final rule from the Department of Housing and Urban Development does not require individuals engaged in mortgage loan modifications or working as third-party mod specialists to be li-censed under the Secure and Fair Enforcement of Mortgage Licensing Act of 2008. But the bad news is that the HUD rule doesn’t exempt them either – it pushes the issue off to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The rule sets a minimum standard for states to adhere to in order to comply with the SAFE Act in licensing mortgage loan originators who don’t ...

The Obama administration needs to move more aggressively than planned if it wants to return the FHA mortgage insurance program to its traditional client base and market size, according to a new analysis by researchers at George Washington University. At a time when many industry and consumer groups are urging policymakers to maintain the status quo so as not to hurt a still fragile housing market, report authors Robert Van Order and Anthony Yezer say FHA loan limits should be ...

Fannie Mae late last week reiterated to lenders its policy on mortgage insurance coverage while it also tweaked its requirements for reporting notifications of MI rescissions, mortgage insurer-initiated cancellations and claim denials. The government-sponsored enterprise’s announcement, published June 30, reminds servicers of their “contractual obligations” to ensure that any MI coverage required by Fannie is maintained. “Mortgage insurance claims must be pursued in a way that will at all times protect Fannie Mae’s ...