The Federal Housing Finance Agency this week announced it would direct Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to implement a three-pronged adjustment in guaranty fee the two government-sponsored enterprises charge lenders, including a 10 basis point g-fee hike beginning in March. The increases – which would boost the average guaranty fee for new loans to over 60 bps – are part of the FHFA’s strategic plan for Fannie and Freddie to attract more private capital to the mortgage market and “improve the relationship between g-fee and risk,” according to FHFA Acting Director Edward DeMarco. As part of the plan, Fannie and Freddie will drop...

Purchase-mortgage originations continued to grow during the third quarter of 2013, with a significant share of the loans coming from loan correspondents, according to a new ranking and analysis by Inside Mortgage Finance. Lenders generated an estimated $218.0 billion in purchase mortgages during the third quarter, the highest three-month volume since the third quarter of 2007. That was up 17.2 percent from the second quarter and it brought year-to-date production to $583.0 billion, up 30.4 percent from the same period in 2012. Refinance production continued...[Includes four data charts]

It wasn’t much of a surprise when the Department of Housing and Urban Development announced FHA loan limits for 2014 that lowered the top high-cost market limit, but many were caught off guard by the change in how limits are calculated and by revised median house prices. HUD this week announced that the cap for single-family mortgages in the most expensive housing markets of the lower 48 states would drop from $729,750 to $625,500. That’s the same as the maximum high-cost limit for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. During the first half of 2013, only about $2.05 billion of FHA loans exceeded $625,500, or about 1.5 percent of FHA business. But the sunset of the FHA provisions in the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008 also meant...

Industry trade groups feared a 10 basis point increase in the g-fee from a budget deal.

A new report from FHFA confirms what small mortgage firms have long known: they can't catch much of break when it comes to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac guaranty fees.

Pricing on GSE risk-sharing deals have been attractive, suggesting that each may be scalable to a significant degree.

Guaranty fees are going up next year, but with a new FHFA director set to take over, loan level price adjustments may be altered.

Although there are only a few weeks left in 2013, a few large mortgage servicing deals may get done yet.

The liberal-leaning ACLU thinks troubled mortgagors are getting the shaft from the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

While Ocwen Financial is laying off staffers, other firms are hiring, including Churchill Mortgage of Brentwood, TN.