The fledgling common securitization platform project isn’t likely to get off course under new Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mel Watt, but it probably won’t be the new regulator’s pet project either, according to industry advisors and investment bankers tracking the CSP’s trajectory. One thing is certain though: Watt – approved by the Senate just this week – is so new to the job that he’s not likely to make any major speeches or policy statements about the project until sometime in January, at the earliest. Industry officials note...

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have made “major steps” in credit risk transfer in 2013 with more where that came from in 2014, but a senior Federal Housing Finance Agency official says the government-sponsored enterprises, at the FHFA’s direction, won’t rely on a single risk-transfer method going forward. In written testimony prepared for the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee’s final hearing on housing finance reform this week, Wanda DeLeo, the FHFA’s deputy director, division of conservatorship, provided an overview of the GSEs’ risk-transfer transactions to date, as well as the pros and cons of each transaction type. “Pricing on all the transactions this year has been...

According to an analysis by Inside Nonconforming Markets, Fannie Mae’s portfolio of guaranteed subprime mortgages is declining much more rapidly than Freddie’s.

From what we understand, some GSE employees with MBS backgrounds are eagerly volunteering their services to the CSS project, believing that the “end product,” the MBS, is where the future lies.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has released a final rule defining a “qualified mortgage” that is insured by the FHA. The final rule will be effective on Jan. 10, 2014. The HUD rule builds off the QM/Ability-to-Repay rule, which the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau finalized earlier this year. The Dodd-Frank Act requires HUD to propose a QM definition that is aligned with the ability-to-repay criteria set out in the Truth in Lending Act and with the agency’s mission to ...

In the third quarter of 2013, the level of home-mortgage debt outstanding grew for the first time since early 2008 as the housing industry continued to climb out of the crater. The Federal Reserve this week announced there was $9.864 trillion of single-family mortgages outstanding at the end of September, a tiny 0.1 percent increase from the previous quarter. But after four and half years of decline, the gain seemed monumental. The central bank noted that all the increase was in first mortgages, while the supply of home-equity loans outstanding continued to shrink. Servicing attached to Ginnie Mae, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac programs continued...[Includes one data chart]

Senior lawmakers in the Senate said they remain “bullish” on moving legislation to the floor sooner rather than later in 2014.

Want to sell a large chunk of MSRs? If it's Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac product you'll have to run the deal past the FHFA.

Officials close to the matter said the MI policy briefing was cancelled due to Senate approval of a new permanent director to the agency, Mel Watt, a former North Carolina Congressman.

In certain ways, HUD’s "qualified mortgage" definition is less restrictive than the CFPB edict, including setting no limit on a borrower’s debt-to-income ratio.