One week after Congress has taken up its fall agenda following a five-week summer recess, it remains to be seen when or even whether the Senate will call for a vote on President Obama’s nominee to head the Federal Housing Finance Agency. In July, Rep. Mel Watt’s nomination cleared the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee along a straight party-line vote, with some key Republicans vowing to block the North Carolina Democrat’s confirmation. While Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-NV, could have moved Watt’s nomination to the floor for a vote before members left for recess on Aug. 2, he did not. The passage of time and confluence of world events have made Watt’s already long odds for confirmation even less likely, according to Compass Point Research & Trading’s Isaac Boltansky.

The Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago will issue mortgage-backed securities guaranteed by Ginnie Mae and backed by mortgages originated by member financial institutions, the two entities announced jointly this week. The new conduit product, called the MPF Government MBS, is an offshoot of the Chicago Bank’s Mortgage Partnership Finance program. The new product is intended to provide smaller mortgage lenders that lack direct access to the secondary mortgage market another option for their home-buying customers. Lenders will be able to choose whether to retain or release servicing on the government loans they originate with a reliable channel for selling their loans, according to FHLBank of Chicago President Matt Feldman.

The official watchdog of Fannie Mae’s and Freddie Mac’s regulator wants to know what’s the holdup with the GSEs’ implementation of new accounting practices to write off overdue single-family residential mortgages. Last month, the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s Office of Inspector General dispatched a “management alert” to the FHFA seeking answers as to why an advisory bulletin directing the GSEs to classify any single-family residence loan delinquent for 180 days or more as a “loss” has yet to be implemented. OIG issued the bulletin in April 2012, but the FHFA has given Fannie and Freddie until Jan. 1, 2015, to fully implement it.

A widely-expected reduction in conforming loan limits in 2014 by the Federal Housing Finance Agency will likely be confined to a handful of states, but that’s not stopping industry stakeholders and advocates from worrying about the implications of tighter credit for middle-income homebuyers in high-priced markets. Currently, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans are capped at $625,500 in high-cost areas and it’s been stuck at $417,000 for everywhere since 2006. According to an analysis by Barclays Capital, the FHFA currently has the authority absent additional legislation to lower the base GSE conforming loan limit under the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008. Lowering the conforming limit would in turn reduce the high-cost limit.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac saw their combined business in single-family mortgage-backed securities decline during the first six months of 2013 with nonbank lenders making up well over one-quarter of their business, according to an Inside The GSEs analysis. The two GSEs pumped out some $693.6 billion in new single-family MBS during the first and second quarters. With a 28.5 percent market share, nonbank sellers accounted for $197.4 billion of Fannie and Freddie loans sold during the January through June period.Nonbanks as a whole made the most of the retail channel (55.1 percent) during the six-month period, which was generally comparable to all GSE sellers (60.2 percent), while the gap widened in the correspondent channel between nonbanks (19.9 percent) and all GSE sellers (29.0 percent).

Banks and savings institutions in the second quarter of 2013 reported the lowest volume of mortgage repurchases and indemnifications since the buyback blight really bit into the industry four years ago, according to a new call report analysis by Inside Mortgage Trends. Banks and thrifts reported $2.671 billion in mortgage repurchases and indemnifications during the second quarter, the industry’s lowest since the second quarter of 2009, when buybacks totaled $2.059 billion ... [Includes one data chart]

Large parts of the Bay Area and Southern California qualify for the top high-cost limit, while other California markets such as San Diego ($546,250) and Sacramento ($474,950) have intermediate high-cost limits.

The letter to members of Congress is notable for which trade groups didn't sign on, including the American Bankers Association and Mortgage Bankers Association.

A widely-expected reduction in conforming loan limits for 2014 would help the jumbo market continue to broaden its footprint in mortgage originations, but the impact would be largely confined to a handful of states, according to a new Inside Mortgage Finance analysis. Jumbo production – originations of home loans that exceed varying conforming loan limits around the country – has been the brightest spot in a mortgage outlook made increasingly gloomy by rising interest rates. Non-agency jumbo originations rose 9.3 percent from the first to the second quarter, while total originations of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and FHA loans fell 3.8 percent. Jumbo mortgages accounted...[Includes four data charts]

Stonegate Mortgage plans to raise up to $100 million in an initial public offering, according to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission late last week. Meanwhile, stock prices for other mortgage-related companies that priced IPOs this year have declined. Stonegate is unique among mortgage company IPOs this year in that it’s not a real estate investment trust. Three of the four mortgage-related IPOs that have priced in 2013 have been for REITs and the other was a nonbank affiliated with a REIT. Stonegate was founded...