Regional banks generally reported improvements to mortgage-banking income in the third quarter of 2014, according to an analysis by Inside Mortgage Trends. Third-quarter mortgage-banking income for a group of 17 regional banks rose 10.7 percent from the previous quarter and was up 12.5 percent from the third quarter of 2013, when some of the lenders reported record origination volumes. Results were mixed among the group. Flagstar Bank reported $58.40 million in mortgage-banking income ...

Chicago-based Guaranteed Rate claims to have significantly advanced towards the world’s first fully digital mortgage with Transfersafe, its latest cloud-based technology service for homebuyers. “Transfersafe is the next major step in our evolution of the mortgage process,” said Victor Ciardelli, company president and CEO. “We’ve already brought our online loan application to the market, which has funded more than $3 billion in loans to date.” Transfersafe facilitates instant ...

EverBank has relied on its correspondent jumbo business to help prop up loan origination volume in 2014 at a time when agency production figures have fallen way off 2013 levels. In fact, during the third quarter of 2014, 52 percent of the company’s $2.30 billion of new mortgage lending were jumbos. Jumbo production – most of it coming through EverBank’s correspondent program – was up 55 percent from the third quarter of 2013, when it accounted for 28 percent of the bank’s total mortgage originations ...

Residential production volume may not be much better next year, but that isn’t stopping certain growth-minded lenders from hiring loan officers. According to a survey conducted by affiliated newsletter Inside Mortgage Finance, 71 percent of mortgage companies plan to hire LOs – in varying degrees – over the next six months. Just 29 percent of respondents said they plan to cut staff. While a number of large commercial banks have pulled back from the mortgage industry in different ways ...

It could take years for the non-agency mortgage-backed securities market to even approach the depth and liquidity it had before the housing meltdown, according to experts participating on a panel during the annual convention of the Mortgage Bankers Association this week in Las Vegas. The main reason non-agency MBS issuance does not amount to much is the huge bank demand for jumbo mortgages, said Tom Millon, president and CEO of Capital Markets Cooperative. Only about 77 percent of ...

Ginnie Mae this week provided new details to the long-anticipated plan for increased issuer net worth and liquidity and a new performance scoring method for issuer activity – changes that could adversely affect small issuers and portfolio servicers. In remarks at the Mortgage Bankers Association’s annual convention in Las Vegas, Ginnie Mae President Ted Tozer said the changes are part of a larger effort to ensure the continuing flexibility and availability of the agency’s mortgage-backed securities program to as many entities as possible. New types of issuers and counterparties have entered the agency-backed MBS market in the wake of the financial crisis, which called for adjustments and tailored approaches to the evolving housing finance market, Tozer noted. Tozer said both policy changes and staff expertise will ensure the success of ...

A top-ranking housing official soon to become acting FHA commissioner assured lenders that the agency is reviewing the pricing of its mortgage insurance, but made no promises during the annual convention of the Mortgage Bankers Association held this week in Las Vegas. Biniam Gebre, now the deputy assistant secretary for housing at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, said the agency “has been reviewing our premium levels on a regular basis.” He added, “I’m sure we will come back to it over the next couple months and next year.” The pricing of FHA mortgage insurance premiums “is a very important question,” Gebre said. Many in the mortgage industry have been focused on the availability of credit, but the affordability of credit is important as well, he added. “We believe we reached a tipping point when we raised premiums in response to ...

While the FHA’s share of the primary insurance market has dropped significantly since premiums were hiked in early 2013, the VA program and the rural housing loan program run by the Department of Agriculture are going strong, according to agency officials. During a panel discussion at the Mortgage Bankers Association annual convention this week, VA and Rural Development executives said that both agencies have been quietly building mortgage market share. Jeffrey London, deputy director of the VA’s loan guaranty service, reported that purchase-mortgage VA loan originations were up 11 percent in fiscal 2014, with 40 percent of the business being first-time homebuyers. Of that group, 80 percent took no-downpayment VA loans, the biggest selling point in the program, along with its relatively low costs. In earlier remarks, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro revealed that ...

Buyers, sellers and real estate agents have until the end of 2014 to take advantage of the property-flipping waiver that the FHA had put in place in 2010 to increase the availability of affordable homes for first-time homebuyers and other purchasers. After Dec. 31, the Department of Housing and Urban Development will let the waiver lapse subjecting investors again to property-flipping prohibitions. Lenders say the waiver program worked well in underserved and hard-hit areas but HUD believes the program’s initial objectives have been attained and that prudence and vigilance are again called for to prevent abuses and potential losses. As a rule, the FHA prohibits “property flipping” in which a recently acquired property undergoes a minor makeover, is appraised with an artificially high value and is resold for a considerable profit. Most property flipping occurs within a matter of days, which prompted HUD to ...