Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac ended 2016 with a bang when fourth quarter combined earnings totaled stellar results, nearly $9.9 billion, representing the best quarter of the year. Fourth-quarter earnings were largely driven by high gains in the fair market value of the GSEs’ hedges, which gained $10.2 billion on a combined basis. “Interest rates went up in the fourth quarter, therefore you saw an unusually large gain in the accounting,” Freddie CEO Donald Layton told Inside The GSEs. Both GSEs had quarterly earnings increases throughout the year. Fannie reported $5.0 billion in the fourth quarter, up from the $3.2 billion in the third quarter, and Freddie more than...

Distress in the housing market has an impact on the location and types of jobs individuals are willing to take, according to research by the National Bureau of Economic Research. During the most recent recession, distressed borrowers tended to apply for fewer jobs that required relocation and looked for lower-level positions, according to an NBER working paper by Jennifer Brown of the Sauder School of Business at the University of British Columbia and David Matsa of ...

Commercial banks and savings institutions reported a combined $5.479 billion in net income from mortgage-banking activity during the fourth quarter of 2016, according to a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of call-report data. The industry’s mortgage-banking income was up 5.8 percent from the third quarter, lifting the total for the year to $17.544 billion. That was down 4.6 percent from 2015. Bank of America ranked as the top earner in ... [Includes one data chart]

Mortgage balances, the largest component of household debt, rose during the fourth quarter of 2016 as more households took on new mortgage debt during the period, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. The NY Fed’s latest quarterly report on household debt and credit said balances on basic household debt rose in the fourth quarter due partly to stronger, new extensions of mortgage credit. Specifically, mortgage balances shown on consumer credit ...

Redwood CEO Marty Hughes said pricing for jumbo MBS is currently strong, with execution on issuance better than execution for whole loan sales.

Meanwhile, selling Ginnie Mae receivables is still a difficult task…

Moody’s said many of the contributors to the MBS are small, regional entities that lack the sophistication of larger, more established originators.

“Since reaching a trough in mid-2013, the rebound in household debt has been led by student debt and auto debt, with only sluggish growth in mortgage debt,” said one New York Fed official.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac reported record lows in the volume of mortgages that sellers repurchased during the fourth quarter of 2016 because of manufacturing defects, an exclusive new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis reveals. Mortgage seller repurchases or other indemnification to the two government-sponsored enterprises totaled $207.31 million in the final three months of 2016. That was down 37.0 percent from the previous quarter and ... [Includes two data charts]

As interest rates continue to inch upward and refinance activity drops, it stands to reason that more residential lenders will move to cut staff, if they haven’t already. But so far, there have be no major layoffs – at least none that have been registered. But that doesn’t mean industry executives aren’t thinking about it. According to interviews conducted by Inside Mortgage Trends over the past month, it’s a mixed bag when it comes to hiring. Non-agency/nonprime lenders such as ...