Purchasers of distressed mortgages or residuals seeking to service their own portfolio but not wanting to build or buy a servicing platform may take advantage of Ocwen Financial’s new product, PlatformPlus. PlatformPlus is a turnkey servicing operation specially designed for investors in nonperforming mortgages or residuals of non-agency securities that want to get more value from their loans. In discussions with hedge funds and other investors in distressed assets, Ocwen Financial found a desire among these entities for special servicing technology and expertise without having to ...

Fannie Mae is loosening its loan modification requirements regarding “imminent default” by changing its requirements for evaluating a borrower’s financial condition for consideration of a loan modification.According to Announcement SVC-2011-06, the GSE’s revised policy would make the Home Affordable Modification Program less stringent by including non-HAMP modification evaluations for borrowers who are either current or in default but less than 60 days delinquent.

A federal judge in Washington dismissed a class action lawsuit over the Home Affordable Modification Program this week, ruling that a group of New York homeowners lacked the standing to sue their mortgage servicer, as well as Fannie Mae and the Treasury Department.

In an apparent victory for the mortgage industry, the Senate has set aside amendments to an economic development bill that would have established national standards for mortgage servicers and changed the way the FHA collects interest payments on prepaid FHA-insured mortgage loans. The Mortgage Bankers Association and the American Bankers Association warned legislators that adoption of the amendments would be...

Nearly a year after the Dodd-Frank Act authorized $1 billion in funding, the Department of Housing and Urban Development announced the start of the Emergency Homeowners’ Loan Program this week, offering mortgage aid to unemployed homeowners in 28 U.S. states and Puerto Rico. The EHLP is to aid homeowners who, due to a reduction in income, are unemployed or underemployed and at risk of foreclosure. The program is administered...

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau may have been more intensively involved in the 50-state servicer settlement discussions than it has publicly let on, and has tried to keep at least some of its contact with the state attorneys general secret, emails from several state agencies seem to suggest...

The Treasury Department announced that, beginning this month, it is withholding financial incentives for three top mortgage servicers, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo Bank, because their performance in the Obama administration’s Making Home Affordable Program was considered inadequate...

Mortgage Guaranty Insurance Company chalked one up in the win column in some litigation it’s having with Bank of America over MGIC’s decision to rescind flow-policy coverage of 1,400 or so mortgages that were originated by Countrywide between 2006 and 2008...

Jurisprudence related to Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems continues to evolve, but a majority of courts are validating the role MERS plays in the nation’s mortgage finance system, according to a new analysis of recent cases by law firm K&L Gates...

The industry’s foreclosure debacle – including the validity of the transfer of mortgages and the role of MERS – has raised a number of critical public policy questions that industry leaders and policymakers will need to resolve if the market and the industry are to return to a fully functioning form once again, a leading industry legal expert told mortgage compliance officials recently...