In case you’re not keeping tally, there are roughly 387 calendar days remaining before the “capital buffer” at Fannie and Freddie falls to zero on Jan. 1, 2018.

Commercial banks and savings institutions gently nudged their valuations of mortgage servicing rights slightly higher in the third quarter as higher interest rates reduced prepayment expectations. A new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of call reports shows banks put a fair market value of $36.17 billion on their MSR assets at the end of the third quarter. That works out to 0.93 percent of the principal balance of $3.879 trillion of loans serviced for others, up from ... [Includes one data chart]

Then there’s the case of Bill Dallas, the industry veteran who runs Skyline Home Loans in Calabasas, CA. “Winter is coming,” he said in a brief email exchange with Inside Mortgage Finance.

With rates rising almost 75 basis points since the election, more MSR packages should hit the market in the next few weeks.

Of the three reverse mortgage firms, American Advisors Group was fined the most: $400,000...

Have any of the GSE stock speculators that bought on the cheap cashed out of their gains?

Despite higher interest rates, publicly traded mortgage stocks have been rising since the election, but market watchers are cautious that recent gains could evaporate quickly. “Two things are going on here,” said Henry Coffey, an equities analyst at Wedbush Securities. “We’ve had a massive market rally, especially in financial stocks. But the general consensus is that the new administration is going to be less punitive than the current one.” Coffey added...[Includes one data table]

Fannie Mae has not treated its foreclosed properties in African-American and Latino communities the same as those in predominately white neighborhoods, according to a federal lawsuit filed this week by the National Fair Housing Alliance. The NFHA, along with 20 fair housing and civil rights groups, said its investigation found signs of racial discrimination when it comes to the upkeep and marketing of Fannie’s real estate-owned properties in 38 metropolitan areas across the country. These properties in minority neighborhoods were blighted...

Washington state is on track to become the first state to set capital requirements for nonbank mortgage servicers. A proposed rule has been met with resistance from the Mortgage Bankers Association, with the trade group calling on the state to halt the process and wait for pending national standards from the Conference of State Bank Supervisors. In September, Washington’s Department of Financial Institutions proposed capital requirements for nonbank servicers licensed in the state. Under the proposal, servicers would have to meet capital requirements set by the government-sponsored enterprises or a government entity. For servicers that solely handle non-agency mortgages, the Washington DFI proposed...

Two weeks back, United Wholesale Mortgage removed a 25 basis point charge it levied on conventional conforming loans when the borrower opts to manage his or her own real estate taxes and homeowners insurance. (Those payment chores are usually handled by the servicer.) Since making the change, escrow waivers have jumped 12 percent at the nation’s largest wholesaler/broker lender. Company CEO Mat Ishbia declared that other lenders should follow suit if they haven’t already. “I think that overall this is good for the industry as a whole,” he said in an interview. For now, the reaction to UWM’s fee waiver has been...