The FHA has proposed to bring its adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM) rules in line with those of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to enable FHA lenders to comply with the new servicing requirements under the Truth in Lending Act. Specifically, two proposed changes would align both agencies’ interest-rate adjustment and disclosure-notification regulations for ARM borrowers as required by the revised TILA. The CFPB issued its final TILA servicing rule in February 2013 but delayed the effective date for another year to allow the Department of Housing and Urban Development sufficient time to write rules for new notification requirements for FHA-insured ARMs with a 30-day look-back period. Hence, FHA ARMs must comply with the new TILA rule on or after Jan. 10, 2015. The FHA insures 1-, 3-, 5-, 7- or 10-year ARMs. The CFPB’s revised look-back period and notification requirements would ...

The National Association of Federal Credit Unions is calling upon the CFPB and the Federal Housing Finance Agency to be more transparent about how they plan to use the information they want to collect for their joint National Mortgage Database. “First and foremost, NAFCU believes greater transparency should be provided by the FHFA and CFPB on what this information is being used for and which divisions within each agency have access to it,” NAFCU Regulatory Affairs Counsel Angela Meyster said in a letter to the FHFA. In addition, NAFCU urged the FHFA and CFPB to select only robust and representative subsets of the data when they seek to use it to support particular policies or rulemakings. “Further, the agencies should ...

“Due to the new Dodd-Frank guidelines, fewer buyers will be qualified to purchase homes, which will ultimately affect my livelihood as well,” one Realtor said.

Marc Savitt, who runs The Mortgage Center in West Virginia, said he recently worked on a mortgage that had 4.5 points of LLPAs. “It was a cash-out refi,” he noted.

Originations that don’t meet standards for qualified mortgages have largely been held in bank portfolios in the months since the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s ability-to-repay rule took effect. However, nonbanks are also eyeing the products, and industry participants suggest that non-QMs will eventually be included in non-agency mortgage-backed securities. Laurence Platt, a partner at the law firm of K&L Gates, said a number of hedge funds and investment banks are ...

Some 69.9 percent of homes purchased in April were completed with non-cash financing, up from a 69.7 percent share the previous month.

Retail lending, which includes traditional loan-origination offices and consumer-direct operations, was down 60.0 percent from the first quarter of last year, slightly worse than the 58.0 percent downturn in the overall market.

But legislators denied federal funding for a new pilot program – Homeowners Armed with Knowledge – that would broaden use of housing counseling tied to FHA originations and servicing.

The privately held nonbank has carefully ratcheted up the maximum from $750,000 to $1 million and now $1.5 million.

“I don’t think it gets sold for the time being,” said one analyst speaking under the condition his name not be used. “It needs lots of restructuring yet.”