Mortgage underwriting standards have loosened in recent years, led by the jumbo market and reduced overlays on agency mortgages, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. However, underwriting standards aren’t nearly as lenient as they were in the early 2000s, prompting some to call for further loosening. The MBA’s Mortgage Credit Availability Index has trended up since the beginning of 2012. “Most of the action in terms of loosening has been on the jumbo side,” said Michael Fratantoni, MBA chief economist, at a talk hosted this week by the Urban Institute’s Housing Finance Policy Center. Separately, he noted...

Molly Boesel, a senior economist at CoreLogic, said mortgages originated in the past four years are among the most pristine loans made in the past two decades.

“There’s a lot of 60- and 70-year old mortgage managers out there.”

BofA has been a steady seller of mortgage servicing rights the past three years and seems to have no interest in being a subservicer.

Profit margins and a number of other mortgage banking metrics will continue to be stable in the first quarter of 2015, according to a Fannie Mae survey of senior executives at 192 lenders. “The share of lenders reporting a decreased profit margin outlook over the next three months appears to have remained relatively stable at around 30 percent since the second quarter,” Fannie said of the fourth-quarter survey results. Compliance costs, declining demand from borrowers and ...

The share of lenders reporting a decreased profit margin outlook over the next three months appears to have remained relatively stable.

The category of “incorrect information” continues to make up the lion’s share of the complaints, ICFPB found.

Some banks pay between 50 and 80 basis points per loan. At the top end of the market are loan officers who earn between 150 and 200 basis points per transaction.

According to figures compiled by Inside Mortgage Finance, Wells Fargo was the nation’s largest home lender in the third quarter with $49.95 billion. JPM was a distant second.

The lion’s share of mortgage repurchase activity involving Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during the third quarter of 2014 continued to involve loans securitized before the two government-sponsored enterprises were put in conservatorship back in 2008, according to a new analysis by Inside Mortgage Trends. At the same time, however, the 2013 book of business is getting a lot more attention at the two GSEs. Although Fannie and Freddie wrapped up their reviews of ... [Includes two data charts]