The warehouse lending sector rises and falls depending on the origination volume of nonbank mortgage providers. The first quarter of 2019 yielded a 4.1% drop in loan production but warehouse commitments increased by 4.4%. Now, with rates headed lower, better days are ahead. But will it last?
It's common knowledge in the industry that the Treasury Department is working on a recap-and-release plan for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. To pull off such a massive undertaking the government will need an investment banker. But who?
Most of the 20% surge in refinance business likely came from rate-term transactions rather than cash-out deals. First-timers held up slightly better than re-peat buyers.
Former investment banker and Freddie Mac executive Bruce Witherell has parted ways with Promontory MortgagePath, a vendor owned by Eugene Ludwig, who once headed the OCC. Witherell is currently fielding offers.
In one of the largest M&A deals of the year, Freedom has agreed to buy RoundPoint Mortgage but details are hard to come by, including the issue of debt assumption. Meanwhile, industry advisors fear that declining interest rates might put other transactions on hold.
In a speech this week before the annual secondary market conference of the Mortgage Bankers Association, FHFA Director Mark Calabria sounded a little bit like the Mark Calabria of the Cato Institute.
We're halfway through the second quarter and MSR sales are middling, a byproduct of lower interest rates and what may lie ahead. However, dealmakers believe 2H could bring a boom in sales activity.
Conventional-conforming lending still accounted for over half of first-lien originations in early 2019, but the sector also saw the biggest rate of decline from the previous period. Booming refi business helped the jumbo market.
Pretium Partners, a fund managed by former Goldman Sachs official Don Mullen, is reportedly in talks to buy non-QM lender Deephaven Mortgage. Will a deal come off? Deephaven has Goldman ties as well in the form of CEO Matt Nichols, a former alum of the white-shoe investment banking firm.
The National Association of Realtors this week picked apart FHFA's plan to recapitalize the GSEs and release them from conservatorship. NAR, by the way, favors a model where the GSEs are morphed into shareholder-owned utilities.
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