The FHA this week clarified its policy on insuring mortgages with PACE (Property Assessed Clean Energy) senior tax liens to make it easier for borrowers to obtain FHA financing for such mortgages, but the mortgage and real estate industries continue to have concerns. The new guidelines address state programs where the PACE obligation is treated like a property tax with priority over an FHA lien. The program provides financing for home-energy improvements and water conservation, and is repaid through an assessment added to the property’s tax bill. The guidelines are designed...

The bank’s residential whole loan portfolio (based on average balances) totaled $275.85 billion at quarter’s end compared to $266.02 billion a year ago.

Progress Residential is preparing to issue a new single-family rental security that will lead to the payoff of a $473.2 million deal issued by the firm in 2014. The payoff will mark the first time a single-family rental security has prepaid, according to industry analysts. The planned Progress 2016-SFR1 is a single-borrower single-family rental securitization that was initially planned to be backed by a $657.27 million loan secured by mortgages on 4,068 rental homes, according to ratings by Kroll Bond Rating Agency, Moody’s Investors Service and Morningstar Credit Ratings. A portion of the proceeds will fund the prepayment of Progress 2014-SFR1. The deal issued...

For several months now, there have been predictions about a massive correction in the bond market, which could cause red ink to spill …

We don’t know who will lead the new administration, though for Ginnie’s sake, it’s likely that both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton won’t mess with the agency or its charter. Right?

House Republicans this week accused the Department of Housing and Urban Development of giving preferential treatment to political favorites in changes to FHA distressed asset sales. House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling, R-TX, denounced changes HUD Secretary Julian Castro made to the Distressed Asset Sale Program (DASP), saying the moves help liberal special interests at the expense of private investors. Hensarling said the changes would create “preferential bidding” for certain buyers and restrict investor options. HUD expanded DASP in 2012 as a conduit for selling nonperforming FHA loans to investors with the proviso they must first help borrowers save their homes from foreclosure and foreclose only if all loan-modification options have been exhausted. Distressed note sales also helped stabilize FHA’s Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund and have contributed more than ...

The Department of Veterans Affairs has clarified policies that have raised questions among VA lenders but were not addressed during the agency’s annual lender conference in San Diego, CA, back in May. ? What is the VA’s policy regarding a non-purchasing spouse’s (NPS) credit? VA: The NPS’s liabilities need to be considered but not its credit history. ? What is VA’s policy regarding a loss that an NPS reports on a joint tax return? If a joint tax return shows a business loss, then that loss will have to be deducted from the veteran’s income in both community and non-community property states. What is reported to the Internal Revenue Service must be used when applying for a federally guaranteed loan In a situation where a couple has been faced with business losses, the veteran and his or her spouse may want to consider both being on the loan in order to potentially qualify. ? The VA Pamphlet states: “Account balances reduced to ...

Freedom Mortgage Corp. is now ready to compete full time with the big boys in the rural housing market with its recent purchase of JPMorgan Chase’s rural housing business. The price of the deal was not disclosed. Freedom Mortgage’s newly acquired USDA origination platform kicked into gear on July 1, primed to serve rural-housing borrowers through its correspondent channel. Overall, the purchase would catapult the New Jersey-based nonbank to becoming the leading seller of USDA rural housing loans to Ginnie Mae. Chase Home Finance led all other USDA mortgage lenders in the first quarter of 2016 with $1.2 billion in total originations, which is 31.5 percent of all USDA-backed loans produced during the period. Freedom Mortgage was the largest VA lender and the second largest FHA lender in 2015. The acquisition of Chase’s USDA business would make Freedom the second largest, if not the ...

CA Legislature Poised to Pass Protections for Widowed Homeowners. The California legislature is a step away from enacting legislation that would extend existing foreclosure protections in the state Homeowners Bill of Rights (HBOR) to widows, widowers and other heirs of deceased homeowners. The legislature passed the HBOR in 2012 to provide due process protections to homeowners and establish rules and procedures for communication between servicers and borrowers regarding options to avoid foreclosure. However, the bill’s protections did not extend to surviving spouses and successors-in-interest who may wish to continue paying the mortgage loan but could not assume the loan or afford the payment with the loss of the deceased homeowner’s income. Surviving family members may then seek a loan assumption or modification, only to be refused by the servicer because their names are not on the ...

At June 30, JPM held $175.8 billion of residential whole loans in portfolio, a gain of $7.06 billion over the reading at March 31.