The Department of Veterans Affairs has issued a policy clarifying that VA lenders must treat veterans in same-sex or opposite-sex marriages equally and fairly when processing and underwriting their home-loan applications. The policy is effective immediately. Under the new policy announced on May 19, the VA will process all claims and applications involving same-sex marriages in the same manner as claims and applications based on opposite-sex marriages, “without any additional scrutiny or development.” Language on VA forms, web pages and other VA communication materials will be revised to ensure that all veterans, VA program administrators and personnel are aware of the equal-treatment policy. The new instructions require VA lenders to accept a claimant’s or an applicant’s assertion of ...
Congress is considering streamlining the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s single- and multifamily housing programs as lawmakers expressed concern about reports of inefficiency, inflexible underwriting and weak risk management. In an oversight hearing conducted recently by the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Housing and Insurance, lawmakers also considered a suggestion to merge the USDA’s Rural Housing Service and FHA single-family mortgage insurance programs because of overlapping functions and certain similarities in their borrower profiles. “The process of dealing with RHS is a nightmare,” said Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO), vice chairman of the committee. “It is 2015 but we have a housing program that operates like it is 1975.” Complaints against the RHS include little or no accountability across government programs, significant lack of ...
FHA Releases Planned System Enhancements for SF Policy Handbook. The FHA is providing an overview of the FHA Connection (FHAC) system enhancements to help lenders get ready before the Single-Family Policy Handbook’s Sept. 14, 2015, effective date. The system enhancements primarily affect three screens in the FHAC case assignments, appraisal logging and insurance application. In the coming weeks, FHA plans to provide technical details for entities using direct interface with FHAC. FHA Announces Availability of Recorded Training Modules for SF Policy Handbook. FHA-approved mortgagees may now use new-recorded training modules to guide them through the ...
Although no “large” mortgage companies have changed hands in quite some time, investor interest in small to medium-sized lenders remains strong as banks, private-equity funds and nonbanks continue to show their interest as buyers. Since last fall, at least 25 deals have been publicly disclosed, according to sales tracked by Inside Mortgage Finance, but none of the originators have been larger than $4 billion a year in production. According to interviews conducted over the past week with investment banking advisors, in the months ahead lenders that originate between $500 million to $2 billion a year are...
It stands to reason that by waiving the charge that Freddie might take in less revenue, but a GSE spokesman said as a financial matter, “it’s not material.”
The former analyst said Freddie has “an inferior security [MBS] necessitating the need for a lot of time and expense to create a common securitization platform…”
All three mortgage-production channels saw increased volume during the first quarter of 2015, but brokers made the most of the rising market, according to a new Inside Mortgage Finance ranking and analysis. Mortgage brokers produced an estimated $39.0 billion of home mortgages during the first three months of 2015, an increase of 14.7 percent over the fourth quarter. That pushed the broker share of originations to 10.8 percent, the sector’s highest market share since 2010. Retail production facilities did...[Includes five data tables]
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