Further declines in refinance activity and some softening in home-purchase lending pushed agency single-family MBS production down to just $93.57 billion in October, according to a new ranking and analysis by Inside MBS & ABS. October was the first month since September 2011 that agency MBS issuance fell below the $100 billion mark. Production last month was down 12.3 percent from September, and it represented the sixth consecutive monthly decline. There was...[Includes two data charts]

The Federal Housing Finance Agency has picked two “final” candidates to be CEO of the joint venture developing a common securitization platform for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and, potentially, some non-agency MBS issuers. According to industry officials close to the matter, Peter Carroll is one of the candidates to head Common Securitization Solutions, the name of the entity developing the platform. Carroll is currently the assistant director for mortgage markets at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The identity of the other candidate could not be confirmed...

It does not appear to be a matter of whether a Senate housing finance reform bill will include an affordable-housing component but rather how to structure one that gets both Democrats and Republicans behind it. During a hearing this week, Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Chairman Tim Johnson, D-SD, said that an affordable housing component is “imperative” to any reform legislation that he and Ranking Member Mike Crapo, R-ID, move through committee. “Fannie Mae’s and Freddie Mac’s mission is...

There was no surprise about why. Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae securitized a total of $41.71 billion of refinance loans in October, down 22 percent from the previous month.

The bipartisan Senate blueprint for secondary mortgage market reform includes several key provisions designed to facilitate small-lender access when Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are no longer around.

The mortgage slowdown will separate the men from the boys, the girls from the ladies. It's time to fire all underperforming loan officers, says mortgage consultant David Lykken.

The top Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee said that she and other members on the panel are drafting “an alternative approach” to improve upon the existing housing-finance reform proposals currently circulating in both chambers of Congress. Rep. Maxine Waters, D-CA, noted during a speech at a Bipartisan Policy Center Housing Commission Policy Forum this week that the proposal in progress would encompass the set of principles House Democrats issued in July “with a particular emphasis on preserving an affordable 30-year, fixed rate mortgage.”

Congress is making an important start on GSE reform but a final, tangible product may not come to fruition for several more years, according to Capitol Hill insiders. Speaking at the Mortgage Bankers Association’s annual convention in Washington, DC, last week, former House Financial Services Committee Senior Counsel Michael Borden and former Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee Staff Director Dwight Fettig agreed it’s a virtual certainty that a final reform bill will not materialize during the 113th Congress.

Servicers working for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are now prohibited from being reimbursed altogether for expenses associated with lender-placed insurance practices, the Federal Housing Finance Agency announced this week. The FHFA’s action follows a notice the agency published in March calling for seller/servicers to be prohibited from accepting sales commissions or fees related to lender-placed or force-placed insurance where a conflict exists between them and the insurance providers and their affiliates.

Spencer Stuart, a search firm working for the Federal Housing Finance Agency, has talked to a top official at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau about being the CEO of the fledgling Common Securitization Solutions platform project, Inside The GSEs has learned. The candidate for the CEO job is Peter Carroll, who currently serves as assistant director for mortgage markets at the CFPB.