Industry participants who track various FHA data, including Home Equity Conversion Mortgage loans and Neighborhood Watch compare ratios, may have noticed delays in their postings. For example, the latest available data for HECM originations was in September, the end of fiscal year 2012, and no updates have been posted since. David Stevens, president and chief executive officer of the Mortgage Bankers Association, also wondered why Neighborhood Watch was down. He suspected lack of funding. A Department of Housing and Urban Development spokesman explained that the FHA’s reporting timelines and procedures are undergoing ...

The Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Office of the Inspector General has alerted the FHA of significant potential losses because a California-based direct endorsement lender allowed certain FHA-insured loans with prohibited restrictive covenants to be recorded. An OIG audit of 84 FHA-insured loans underwritten by Standard Pacific Mortgage of Irvine, CA, found 28 loans with unallowable restrictive covenants that were recorded in certain Florida and Arizona county registers. The loans were closed between Jan. 1, 2008, and Dec. 31, 2011, the OIG said. Of the 28 loans, 15 resulted in ...

NCOA Booklet Required Reading for HECM Borrowers. The National Council on Aging has announced the availability of the 2013 version of “Use Your Home to Stay at Home,”, the official reverse mortgage booklet approved by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. The booklet is designed to help older homeowners understands the pros and cons of a reverse mortgage. Federal law requires that all individuals who are considering a reverse mortgage go through pre-counseling by a HUD-approved counseling agency and receive a copy of the NCOA guide. The NCOA also offers other ...

Although it’s well known that mortgage bankers earned record profits on loan production and secondary marketing last year, a new analysis by Inside Mortgage Trends reveals that mortgage servicing was also highly profitable for the industry’s top lenders. A diverse group of 10 top lenders reported a whopping $16.98 billion in net income from mortgage production and secondary marketing last year, after posting a combined loss of $5.79 billion in 2011. Massive repurchase expenses reported by ... [Includes one data chart]

Real estate investment trusts focused on investing in agency mortgage-backed securities were called out last week by Federal Reserve Governor Jeremy Stein. Industry participants acknowledge the Fed’s concerns and suggest that agency REIT investment strategies will naturally shift as yields on the products have declined, among other factors. Stein warned of “overheating” markets and pointed to agency-focused mortgage REITs. “When I say that the market for a particular class of credit instruments ...

Low interest rates and improving fundamentals in the nation’s housing market appear to be driving renewed investor interest in residential mortgage loan participations, according to a market participant. Jim Cutillo, chief executive officer of Stonegate Mortgage, said the market for loan participations has grown so strong in the last few months that banks – Wall Street financial institutions as well as small and regional banks – are pursuing investment opportunities in the sector. “I think a lot ...

Officials in the financial services sector are making a fresh push to alert the mortgage and residential mortgage-backed securities industries to the potential pitfalls that delinquent homeowner association accounts pose for them. “The securitization industry has little understanding” of homeowner and other types of community associations, collectively referred to as HOAs, said Jason Serrano, co-head of structured products and managing director for securities at Oak Hill Advisors ...

The ranks of non-agency mortgage-backed security issuers are set to expand beyond Redwood Trust and Credit Suisse, but industry analysts note that issuance remains constrained due to bank portfolio execution and the government-sponsored enterprises. At the American Securitization Forum’s ASF 2013 conference last week in Las Vegas, Laurie Goodman, a senior managing director at Amherst Securities Group, predicted $25 billion to $30 billion in new non-agency MBS will be issued this year, the most ...

A deeply divided House Financial Services Committee took on FHA solvency this week as critics and defenders clashed over the agency’s practices, financial health and future role in the nation’s housing market. The distinctly partisan tone of the hearing quickly raised doubt as to whether the Republican majority and their Democratic opponents can come to some compromise to strengthen the FHA and reduce its risk to taxpayers. Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling, R-TX, echoed complaints by Republican colleagues that the FHA is ...

An announced 10 basis-point hike in the FHA mortgage insurance premium (MIP) may bolster the health of the FHA Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund and speed up shrinkage of FHA market share, but it will also make FHA-insured loans costlier for borrowers. The increase is the latest in a series of premium hikes imposed by the Department of Housing and Urban Development in the past three years to strengthen the MMI Fund’s capital reserves, which lately have fallen to a negative position. Simultaneously, HUD announced other measures to ... [1 chart]