With interest rates up 75 basis points since the election – and staying there, at least for now – residential production is likely to slip in the quarters ahead, leading to layoffs, especially at firms that focus on refinancings. “It’s coming,” said industry consultant Don Henig, a former top sales executive for loanDepot, a top-10 ranked originator. “Maybe we haven’t seen too many layoffs quite yet, but just look at volume numbers and do the math.” Henig added: “Right now, a lot of shops ...
The recent run-up in mortgage rates appears to have suppressed short-term home purchase expectations among prospective homebuyers, who nonetheless otherwise feel optimistic about the housing market over the longer term, according to new data from government-sponsored enterprise Fannie Mae. Fannie’s latest Home Purchase Sentiment Index (HPSI), released earlier this week, dipped 0.5 points to 80.7, the fifth consecutive monthly decline. The index is down ...
While mortgage interest rates remain at historic lows, an increase of even one percentage point is not going to have a dramatic effect on affordability and any negative homebuyer response to rising rates is likely to be short-lived, according to a new Redfin survey. Even if mortgage rates climb to 5 percent, homebuyers would lower their expectations and shop for less expensive homes, said 49 percent of the 827 Redfin real estate agents who responded to the survey. Redfin conducted ...
Black Knight Financial Services is developing a mortgage-specific credit score that could be more useful for lenders than traditional credit scores. It’s not clear how much traction the score will gain, considering that Fair Isaac’s FICO score remains the dominant metric for assessing the creditworthiness of mortgage borrowers. Wesley Winter, a senior modeler at Black Knight, said a traditional credit score may not be the best predictor of mortgage default. “The FICO score is trying to ...
Mortgages guaranteed by the Department of Veterans Affairs accounted for 29.4 percent of insured home loans securitized in the agency mortgage-backed securities market in the fourth quarter of 2016, a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis reveals. That was up from a 27.2 percent share for the VA during the third quarter. The home-loan guaranty program has become a refinance dynamo, accounting for a whopping 44.6 percent of insured refi loans ... [Includes one data chart]
The GSE figures suggest that private MIs saw a measurable drop in new insurance written in the final three months of 2016, but ended the year with a significant increase in volume compared to 2015.
According to exclusive survey figures from Inside Mortgage Finance, the wholesale/broker market share increased to 10.2 percent in the third quarter, its highest reading of the year.
RPM Mortgage, Alamo, CA, is in serious negotiations to buy at least two other mortgage banking firms – or their assets – and has its eye on at least one other shop, according to investment banking officials who claim to have knowledge of the situation. If the acquisitions come to fruition, they could put the privately held nonbank on track to be a $14 billion a year originator, said a source who advises the company. One of the target acquisitions is a $4 billion a year lender, the other a $650 million funder. A spokesman for RPM declined to comment. A few weeks back, RPM made...
With the formal transition of presidential power now a mere week away, Congressional Republicans and Democrats alike were busy this week reordering the teams that will take the field for the 115th Congress. Mortgage lenders are hopeful for at least some degree of regulatory relief from the Republican-controlled Congress and White House, but Democrats are vowing to defend the Dodd-Frank Act, one of the signature achievements of the outgoing Obama administration. Republicans in the House of Representatives got...
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