Who gave up market share to nonbank lenders? The biggest decline was among banks with over $1 trillion in assets: JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of America and Citigroup.

Over the past six months, CashCall has laid off several hundred workers, but continues to advertise in local media markets in Southern California.

Officials at FHA and Ginnie Mae are eager to jump on board and reinvigorate their efforts concerning e-mortgages.

In a development with potentially negative implications for lenders, servicers and investors in student loan ABS, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released a report this week critical of the “auto-default” practice seen in private student lending. According to the CFPB’s Mid-Year Update on Student Loan Complaints, borrowers say that some lenders demand immediate full repayment upon the death or bankruptcy of their loan co-signer, even in cases when the loan is current. Borrowers also said they confronted bureaucratic barriers to releasing co-signers from their loans, something that could help avoid auto-defaults. “Students often rely...

At one shop based in the Midwest there’s unconfirmed talk of loan officers who haven’t been paid for months, unpaid leases and top executives who were on vacation as volumes collapsed.

A number of lenders have loosened their underwriting standards on non-agency products in recent months in an effort to boost originations as demand for refinances plummets. One of the boldest moves was taken by TD Bank, which this week announced a portfolio loan that has a downpayment requirement as low as 3 percent. The loan is part of the lender’s Right Step mortgage program which features low downpayment loans without private mortgage insurance ...

United Wholesale Mortgage is now offering jumbos on a wholesale basis with debt-to-income ratios as high as 49 percent allowed. The loans won’t receive protections for qualified mortgages as the DTI ratio limit for jumbo QMs is 43 percent. Loan amounts on United Wholesale’s Big & Easy Plus loan go up to $1.5 million. The lender said it will allow loan-to-value ratios on the mortgage of up to 75 percent while a borrower will need ... [Includes four briefs]

FHA originations dropped a hefty 28.3 percent in February from January and 59.1 percent from the same period a year ago, according to Inside FHA Lending’s analysis of agency data. FHA lenders reported $8.2 billion in new forward mortgages for February, down from $11.4 billion for January and $19.5 billion from a year ago. Approximately 73.9 percent of the loans were purchase mortgages. Industry observers attributed the continuing decline in FHA production to multiple and costly insurance premium hikes, revocation of the borrower’s right to cancel premium payments during the term of the loan and rising interest rates. For the week ending April 18, the interest rate for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage with FHA insurance increased to 4.20 percent from 4.14 percent, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association weekly application survey. FHA officials said the policy changes were necessary to ... [1 chart]

Wells Fargo has expanded its acceptance of electronic signatures on FHA mortgage-related documents to correspondent lenders – a move that could spur other lenders to consider a similar shift as purchase originations rise. Details of the expansion are available in Wells Fargo current Seller Guide. However, access is restricted to correspondent lenders because the guide contains proprietary information, according to a company spokesman. DocuSign, whose Digitized Transaction Management (DTM) platform is being used by Wells Fargo and other financial services clients, said the expansion follows FHA’s announcement earlier this year of acceptance of e-signatures on all single-family origination and servicing/loss mitigation documents, FHA claims and real estate-owned sales contracts, with the exception of notes. The FHA announcement builds on an ...

HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan said this week that housing finance reform can no longer be put off, but no more so than for the FHA which continues to play an “outsized role” in the mortgage market as private capital remains on the sidelines. Speaking in New York at an event co-hosted by the Bipartisan Policy Center, Donovan said the Obama administration is squarely behind the legislative proposal by Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee Chairman Tim Johnson, D-SD, and Ranking Member Mike Crapo, R-ID. “Despite its imperfections, does this bill represent progress? Absolutely,” said Donovan, seeking to win over housing advocacy groups disenchanted with the bill. “When looking for ways to improve [the bill], let’s not lose sight of its potential. Let’s not forget its importance to the housing market and its future.” The Johnson-Crapo legislative proposal calls for a wind-down of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and creation of a ...