VA posted an 11.6 percent increase in originations in the third quarter, reversing a downward slide that began in early 2017. VA lenders ended the period with $45.5 billion in new originations, up from $40.8 billion in the previous quarter. The nine-month VA volume totaled $129.1 billion with purchase mortgages providing a strong boost. Streamlined refinancing, or Interest Rate Reduction Refinance Loans, accounted for 16.8 percent of VA loans originated and securitized during the nine-month period. The top five VA lenders in sequential order – USAA, Veterans United Home Loans, Quicken Loans, Navy Federal Credit Union and Freedom Mortgage – ended the third quarter with a combined $11.05 billion in originations and a 24.7 percent share of the market. Top-ranked USAA reported a 17.0 percent drop in VA lending in the third quarter from the previous quarter. Over the nine-month period, it racked up ... [charts]

Officials at HomeStreet Bank defended the bank’s mortgage business activities this week after facing criticism from one of the largest shareholders in the company.

Mortgage bankers saw modest gains on both sides of their business during the third quarter of 2017, according to an Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of earnings reports from a dozen publicly held companies.

Commercial banks and savings institutions are not major investors in the non-mortgage ABS market, and their holdings slipped again during the third quarter of 2017, according to a newInside MBS & ABS ranking and analysis.

The vast majority of commercial banks and savings institutions that do mortgage banking – either directly or through a subsidiary – generated a profit from the business during the third quarter, according to a new analysis by Inside Mortgage Trends of bank call reports.

California is a jumbo mortgage gold mine that’s dominated by banks, giving Banc of California an enviable starting point. BoC is also differentiating itself by focusing on non-qualified mortgages and avoiding the retail channel. BoC contributed $122.9 million of jumbo loans to a new mortgage-backed security from JPMorgan Chase. Selling loans into the securitization market is a significant shift for BoC, which had previously only contributed eight mortgages to a jumbo MBS issued in 2014 ...

FHA single-family endorsements rose 2.0 percent in the third quarter from the prior quarter as more borrowers took out purchase loans and nonbanks remained in control of the market during the period. The FHA endorsed $62.1 billion of forward mortgages during the third quarter, which brought total production over the first nine months of 2017 to $182.7 billion (excluding reverse mortgages), a 2.5 percent decline from 2016. Fixed-rate loans continued to comprise nearly all of FHA’s business. Adjustable-rate endorsements totaled $935.3 million for the first nine months of 2017, up from $701.7 million a year ago. FHA purchase activity was up 4.4 percent to $48.5 billion in the third quarter while annual volume increased 2.6 percent from 2016. Purchase loans accounted for 73.6 percent of total FHA endorsements for the nine-month period. Of the $182.7 billion of FHA loans endorsed during the ... [Charts]

Any chance of a mortgage-insurance premium reduction in the near future has dimmed in the wake of an actuarial report placing the FHA insurance fund on shakier ground at the end of FY 2017. One clear thing from the report released on Nov. 15 was that FHA’s flagship single-family home mortgage program continued to grow stronger with an economic net worth of $38.4 billion in fiscal 2017. In contrast, problems persisted in the Home Equity Conversion Mortgage portfolio, driving the program’s economic value down by another $6 billion to negative $14.5 billion. The drag HECM losses inflicted on the MMIF has renewed calls to separate the ailing portfolio from the fund, which can only be accomplished by legislation. Right now, the reverse mortgage issue is not even on Congress’ legislative agenda. HECM losses also caused the fund’s economic net worth and capital reserve ratio to decline in fiscal year ...

The Department of Veterans Affairs and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau have issued a joint warning to servicemembers and veterans about VA refinancing offers that sound too good to be true. There is a good chance that borrowers with a VA loan have already received unsolicited offers to refinance their mortgages even just months after closing, the agencies said in their first “warning order” (WARNO). Many of these refi solicitations promise extremely low rates, thousands of dollars in cash back, skipped mortgage payments, no out-of-pocket costs and no waiting period, the agencies noted. The VA and the CFPB said lenders offering VA refinances may use aggressive and potentially misleading advertising and sales tactics. “Lenders may advertise a rate just to get you to respond or you may receive a VA mortgage refi offer that provides limited benefit to you while adding thousands of dollars to your loan balance,” the agencies warned. Even though the VA prohibits a lender from advertising skip payments on ...

A former FHA commissioner has recommended raising the agency’s capital reserve ratio to 3 percent, to make FHA stronger and more resilient. Carol Galante, who served two years as FHA commissioner and assistant secretary for housing in the second term of the Obama administration, laid out her proposal along with other recommendations in a paper that she co-authored. Housing-finance reform without a retooled FHA could threaten families’ access to homeownership and increase risk to taxpayers, contrary to the goals of reform, said Galante, currently the faculty director of the Terner Center for Housing Innovation at University of California Berkeley. In her paper, Mission Critical: Retooling FHA to Meet America’s Housing Needs, Galante spelled out the changes necessary to help FHA perform its complementary and countercyclical role in the nation’s housing markets. Galante called for ...