The Federal Housing Finance Agency is backing recommendations for additional authority that would allow it to examine third parties that do business with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. In its 2016 Annual Report to Congress released this week, the FHFA said it concurs with recommendations made by both the Government Accountability Office and the Financial Stability Oversight Council that Congress grant the agency authority to oversee the entities that provide critical services to the government-sponsored enterprises. While counterparty oversight is critical to the safety and soundness of the GSEs, it is...

It’s Ginnie Mae by a nose: $1.704 trillion in MBS to Freddie Mac’s $1.703 trillion…

“By limiting the volume of securities that private investors will have to absorb as we reduce our holdings, the caps should guard against outsized moves in interest rates and other potential market strains,” said Fed Chairman Janet Yellen.

First-time homebuyers have fueled a surge in home sales in the last two years, and the trend is continuing into 2017, according to a new report on the first-time homebuyer market from Genworth Mortgage Insurance. The report focused on mortgage origination data from more than 20 million first-time homebuyers over the past 24 years, with some interesting findings. Approximately 85 percent of the overall increase in home sales over the past two years was...

Fun fact: Ginnie Mae servicing now represents 16.5 percent of all residential debt outstanding – more than triple the program’s market share at the end of 2008.

The Treasury Department this week proposed eliminating the special qualified-mortgage provision that allows Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to acquire loans with debt-to-income ratios that exceed the normal 43 percent limit for QM loans. The special treatment for the government-sponsored enterprises, known as the GSE patch, “creates an unfair advantage for government-supported mortgages without providing additional consumer protection … and inhibits consumer choices by restricting private sector flexibility and participation,” the agency said in a report on financial service regulatory reform. The report urged...

In the first quarter, Amerihome Mortgage had the largest sequential growth rate in USDA lending.

One bright spot consists of Japanese investors, which are showing strong growth in dollar-dominated bond holdings…

American Advisors Group continued to dominate the HECM market, funding $691.0 million of reverse mortgages…

Last month, Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mel Watt said he’s prepared to allow Fannie and Freddie to build some type of capital buffer to avoid a Treasury draw…