Real estate transactions in New Castle County, DE, will no longer be exempt from transfer tax as a conveyance from a governmental entity, following a new ruling from the county’s legal counsel.The New Castle county law department found that Fannie and Freddie are federally chartered private corporations and not governmental agencies. The county’s revised interpretation of the realty transfer tax statute earlier this month, “consistent with the growing practice in other jurisdictions,” has prompted the county to enforce the distinction starting in June.

Both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac held onto their ample shares of mortgage-backed securities with something of a bump during the first quarter of 2012, according to a new Inside The GSEs analysis. The GSEs issued a combined $303.9 billion in MBS during the first quarter, a 13.9 percent increase from the fourth quarter of 2011. Compared to the first quarter of last year, Fannie and Freddie saw a 16.4 percent increase in MBS issuance. Between the two companies, Fannie and Freddie registered a plentiful 77.9 percent share of new MBS during the period that ended March 31, 2012, up from 77.1 percent the two companies held during the fourth quarter of 2011 and much farther apart from the 74.8 percent both GSEs held during the first quarter of 2011.

The White House is backing a trio of Senate bills filed last week to expand the Home Affordable Refinance Program to an even wider circle of underwater borrowers as part of the Obama administration’s re-election “to-do list.” The Equity Rebuilding Act sponsored by Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-OR, would lower costs for some homeowners seeking to refinance through HARP. Under the bill, homeowners who are current on their mortgage seeking to refi into a 20-year loan term or shorter would have their closing costs covered by Fannie and Freddie. A second bill by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-CA, the Expanding Refinancing Opportunities Act of 2012, would create a $6 billion FHA fund to provide insurance for underwater homeowners who currently don’t have a federally backed loan. To pay for the FHA extension, Feinstein would extend by one year the temporary, 10-year, 10 basis point increase of the GSE guarantee fee that took effect April 1.

Investors will be able to bid on Fannie Mae real estate-owned single-family homes intended for rent “in the next few months” but the Federal Housing Finance Agency warns not to expect fire sale prices from its pilot program.FHFA Senior Associate Director for Housing and Regulatory Policy Meg Burns testified last week before a congressional field hearing that the agency is completing its review of investor applications and is on target to complete its first pilot transaction in the next few months. “The application process is comprehensive, rigorous and demanding, requiring exhaustive amounts of information and documentation from the applications and their business partners,” said Burns.

Look for the Federal Housing Finance Agency to press its multiple legal actions against many of the nation’s biggest issuers of non-agency mortgage-backed securities after a federal judge rejected a bid by UBS Americas to turn back the FHFA’s lawsuit over its sale of non-agency MBS to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Judge Denise Cote, of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, two weeks ago denied UBS’ motion to dismiss on statute of limitations grounds, while dismissing the FHFA’s negligent misrepresentation claims. The FHFA, as GSE conservator, sued UBS in July 2011 alleging that billions of dollars of MBS purchased by Fannie and Freddie were based on offering documents that contained “materially false statements and omissions.”

The Federal Housing Finance Agency is requesting public comment on its draft document Strategic Plan: Fiscal Years 2013-2017. The FHFA said it’s updating its plan in order to incorporate the strategic plan for conservatorships of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that the Finance Agency sent to Congress in February.

Fannie Mae received a leg up earlier this month in its defense against a former staffer’s wrongful termination lawsuit when a federal judge ruled that the GSE is not legally considered a government entity while under the conservatorship of its regulator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency. Caroline Herron, a former Fannie vice president who left in 2007 but returned as a consultant in 2009, filed suit against the GSE in June 2010. Herron claims she was wrongly fired for reporting what she said was Fannie’s mismanagement of the Obama administration’s housing rescue initiatives. According to papers filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Herron sought to prove that Fannie was not a private company but an adjunct of the state while under FHFA conservatorship as part of her claim against Fannie. Herron asserted a Bivens claim, a claim under the First Amendment for private damages against federal officials for civil rights violations outside the purview of the Federal Tort Claims Act.

Two separate working papers by Federal Reserve economists conclude that the two government-sponsored enterprises were not significantly responsible for the financial crisis of 2008, and that GSE mortgage standards had only a “modest impact” on loan terms in the years leading up to the mortgage meltdown. Fed economist Valentin Bolotnyy estimates that only 2.5 percent to 5.0 percent of additional credit to high-risk borrowers was made available to meet the GSEs’ Underserved Area Goals, a subset of the Affordable Housing Goals mandated by Congress in 1992. “The results suggest a small UAG effect and...

While many of the largest mortgage lenders in the industry continue to scale back their operations in a somewhat precarious operating environment, a few companies see opportunity in the reshuffling and are hitting the gas pedal. None more than Nationstar Mortgage. Fresh off an initial public offering, the company has been on a buying spree for mortgage servicing and production capacity. Although Nationstar ranked as the 11th largest servicer in the market at the end of March, pending acquisitions would push it all the way to fourth place on a pro forma basis, according to a new...(Includes one data chart)

Mortgage servicers reported significant improvement in loan delinquency rates during the first quarter of 2012, although the inventory of foreclosed units remained at historically high levels. The overall delinquency rate dropped 100.3 basis points to 9.88 percent as of the end of March, according to the Inside Mortgage Finance Large Servicer Delinquency Index. That was the lowest level for the series in three years, and all 18 lenders included in the index reported lower delinquency rates than they had at the end of 2011. The biggest declines were in...(Includes two data charts)