VA Extends Making Home Affordable Program. The Department of Veterans Affairs has extended the Making Home Affordable program to Oct. 1, 2017. The program was set to expire on Jan. 1, 2017. USDA Approves NewFed Mortgage to originate Section 52 Guaranteed Rural Housing Loans. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has approved NewFed Mortgage Corp., a multi-state residential mortgage lender, to originate USDA loans. Based in Danvers, MA, retailer NewFed offers FHA, VA, USDA, conventional and jumbo mortgage products. Reviews Genworth Financial’s Proposed Sale to Chinese Conglomerate. Fannie Mae has approved Arch Capital’s acquisition of ...

Ever since the nation’s financial crisis, commercial banks and other depositories have dominated the second-lien business and likely will continue to do so in the coming years, but that isn’t stopping nonbanks from testing the waters once again. According to research by Inside Mortgage Finance, several nonbanks have slipped back into the market, albeit with muted production volumes. And many of the firms that have crept back in are partnering with depositories. The reason for the strategy is...

Nonbank mortgage-banking profitability models have been much more aggressive than their mortgage bank competition when it comes to paying their loan originators. But many question how nonbanks can afford to pay 100 basis points more than banks. During a recent webinar sponsored by Inside Mortgage Finance, Paul Hindman, managing director of Grid Origination Services, suggested it has to do with “efficiency execution with every step of the mortgage origination.” And which companies are doing this? “Those companies that really can afford to offer this level of compensation and still be profitable,” he added. That being said, there are varying qualifiers that must be satisfied in order to justify paying a higher commission. Hindman spelled out the typical components of loan ...

Mortgage origination and sales continued to rack up hefty earnings during the third quarter of 2016, but a rebound in servicing profits had an even bigger impact on the bottom line, according to a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of earnings reports from 13 major public companies. With a combined $189.5 billion in mortgage originations during the period, the 13 firms reported $2.38 billion in production and secondary-marketing income. That was up ... [Includes one data chart]

Loan origination and secondary marketing pushed profits to a four-year high during the third quarter of 2016, according the latest Mortgage Bankers Performance Report released by the Mortgage Bankers Association. The average mortgage-banking entity earned $3.492 million in net income after adjustments during the third quarter, the MBA reported. That was up 42.8 percent from the previous period and represented the highest average profit since the fourth quarter of ...

Mortgage insurance stocks have been rallying the past month, climbing to 52-week highs, thanks in part to the “Trump rally” and the belief that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have a future after all. Six short months ago, the sector was in the tank with investors fearing that another cut in FHA premiums would erode their market share. The premium cut didn’t happen, and there’s a growing belief that the incoming Trump administration will favor the private sector – and not the FHA – taking on more risk ...

The rise in mortgage rates after the November election gave many lenders the blues, triggering a plunge in near-term expectations for loan demand as well as a big drop in anticipated profit margins over the next three months, according to the latest lender survey from Fannie Mae. Forty six percent of respondents expect profits to decrease. Lenders’ profit margin outlook now is the worst in three years, according to the government-sponsored enterprise. “Lenders reported a significant net negative ...

Lenders that deliver loans to agency buyers and non-agency buyers could benefit from standards developed by the Structured Finance Industry Group and the Mortgage Industry Standards Maintenance Organization. SFIG detailed the data standardization effort in a green paper released last week. The Wall Street group noted that a lack of accepted standards can lead to confusion and disagreement between counterparties and service providers, particularly when data are calculated or ...

The Federal Reserve late last week reported a modest 0.6 percent increase in the volume of single-family mortgages outstanding during the third quarter of 2016, the fifth straight quarterly gain in a market finally recovering from the housing meltdown. Still, at $10.123 trillion, the supply of mortgage debt outstanding was $1.118 trillion below the level it reached at the end of 2007. Most of the growth in the third quarter came...[Includes two data tables]

“Mortgage originations get crushed,” according to the latest forecast from Freddie Mac’s economic and housing research group. A number of industry analysts have adjusted their originations forecasts as interest rates on mortgages have increased recently and could climb higher next year. “Mortgage market activity will be significantly reduced by higher mortgage rates, especially refinance originations, which are likely to be cut in half,” said Sean Becketti, Freddie’s chief economist ...