With loan production costs leaping over the last decade while productivity has been gutted, mortgage lenders are desperate to find a credible, reliable way to measure the effectiveness of their loan origination systems. “From 2005 to 2015, lenders’ costs per loan doubled, but productivity was basically cut in half,” said Stratmor Senior Partner Len Tichy, head of the firm’s information technology and operations advisory services. The numbers reflecting fulfillment costs are downright ...

United Wholesale Mortgage, Troy, MI, has earmarked $500,000 in grant money for a new trade group-backed initiative to allow loan brokers to start their own shops. The best part: more wholesalers are expected to join the effort, which could grow the pool of available funds. At least that’s the word from UWM CEO Mat Ishbia. In an interview with Inside Mortgage Trends this week, Ishbia predicted that other wholesalers will join the effort, though he wasn’t ready to name names ...

The inherent complexity and ambiguity of many of the provisions of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s integrated disclosure rule are stymying the ability of technology to aid in lender compliance, top industry experts said this week. Speaking during a webinar sponsored earlier this week by Inside Mortgage Finance, former CFPB official Benjamin Olson, now a partner with the BuckleySandler law firm in Washington, DC, detailed the obstacles that lenders are confronted with ...

Banks and savings institutions sold $174.7 billion of single-family mortgages as part of their mortgage-banking operations during the second quarter of 2016, according to a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of call-report data. That represented a 20.2 percent increase from the first three months of the year. It brought year-to-date loan sales to $320.0 billion, still 12.2 percent short of the total for the first half of 2015. Banks ended June with ... [Includes one data chart]

The baseline agency conforming loan limit likely will rise slightly next year…

The compensation plan is available to LOs of Atlantic Bay who originate more than $14.0 million in retail loans in a calendar year.

Impac is forecasting $12 billion in originations this year, up 29.0 percent from 2015…

ALTA CEO Michelle Korsmo: “We’ve heard countless stories from ALTA members about consumer confusion at the closing table…”

Maybe calling a delinquent borrower 12 times a day is too much...

Atlantic Bay Mortgage Group recently started offering its loan originators a unique option in terms of compensation: a share of the servicing fee. More than 90 percent of loan originator compensation plans are based on an LO’s volume, according to surveys conducted by Stratmor Group. Atlantic Bay’s Progressive Earnings Plan allows LOs to earn an annuity stream of income from mortgages when the lender retains the servicing. Rebecca Chaney, a senior executive vice president of legal affairs at Atlantic Bay, likened...