Issuance of mortgage securities backed by USDA loans dropped during the first three months of 2018. Approximately $4.03 billion of rural housing loans with a USDA guarantee were delivered in Ginnie Mae MBS during the first quarter, down 18.3 percent from the previous quarter. Agency data also showed an 11.7 percent decline in USDA securitization volume from the same period a year ago. Rural housing loans accounted for 1.5 percent of all loans securitized in Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae pools and 2.8 percent of loans with private or government-backed mortgage insurance. Purchase loans comprised the bulk of USDA loans that were delivered into Ginnie MBS pools. PennyMac knocked Freedom Mortgage out of first place with a total of $753.3 million in securitized USDA loans despite a 10.4 percent decline in production. Freedom Mortgage accounted for $523.3 million of USDA loans pooled in ... [Charts]

Quicken Loans surpassed Wells as the top retail lender in the first quarter of 2018, according to Inside Mortgage Finance.

Last October, HomeStreet cut 60 employees. In May, it put out for bid $5 billion of mortgage servicing rights….

When trouble hits, a mortgage lender has two main choices: sell the company’s assets or hand over the office keys to the landlord and tell your employees the ugly truth.

Aggressive nonbank lenders are willing to offer 100 to 200 basis points per loan…

Despite heralding the investment made by Thomas H. Lee Partners, Guaranteed Rate will not say how much the PE firm invested or how large of a stake it acquired…

Mark Stafford, managing director of MS Capital Advisors: “Margin compression is real and many companies lost money in the first quarter.”

Fannie Mae: “We expect this will prompt businesses to turn to cost-cutting..."

Mortgage brokers actually gained some share in the government market…

A 34-year veteran of the home lending industry, Goulding also worked for Wells Fargo Home Mortgage…