Upset at what they perceive as being kept out of the loop as the White House and the Federal Housing Finance Agency look to jumpstart the GSEs’ underperforming refinance program, House Democrats are dealing themselves into the process starting with a meeting with the FHFA’s head next week.Reps. Dennis Cardoza, D-CA, and Elijah Cummings, D-MD, are “tentatively scheduled” to sit down with FHFA Acting Director Edward DeMarco on Oct. 6 to discuss the lawmakers’ ideas on how to best improve the two-year-old Home Affordable Refinance Program, according to a Cardoza spokesman.

Preliminary results of a new evaluation program unveiled earlier this year by Fannie Mae indicate that some of the GSE’s servicers are satisfactorily meeting Fannie’s performance goals while others were below median performance levels during the first half of 2011.

Its decision to dump its wholesale correspondent channel is the latest in a series of moves by Bank of America to distance itself from “legacy” mortgage issues, but analysts remain doubtful. Moody’s Investors Service last week downgraded the bank’s rating. “The downgrades result from a decrease in the probability that the U.S. government would support the bank, if needed,” thanks to the passage of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, the ratings firm said. Moody’s said that the government is likely to continue to provide some level of support to systemically important financial institutions. “However, it is also...

Mortgage lenders need to get a better understanding of their business in today’s economic and regulatory environment and be able to make important decisions quickly in order to stay competitive, according to industry experts. Having more thoughtful insight into the mortgage business lies in the ability of a lender to go deep into its mortgage portfolio and see the risks and opportunities. The key to improving portfolio performance, experts say, is better analytics and using solutions to maximize the value of the portfolio. Today, banks are forced to redefine their loan accounting reporting in light of new regulatory requirements and expectations of...

A majority of Americans say that they would be unable to pay their mortgage if they lose their jobs. According to a new Country Financial survey, 68 percent of homeowners say that, were they laid off, they wouldn’t have the means to continue paying their mortgages after nine months. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics from August 2011 place average length of unemployment at slightly under 10 months, meaning that most Americans could be a pink slip away from delinquency. For some, the situation is more ominous. Slightly less than a third of Americans – 31 percent – say that they would only be able to continue...

In a proposal that could reshape the economics and competitive landscape of the mortgage industry, the Federal Housing Finance Agency this week proposed two alternatives for servicing compensation on future Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac business that could end up being the model for the market beyond the government-sponsored enterprises.“As the recent problems in managing mortgage delinquencies suggest, the current servicing compensation model was not designed for current market conditions,” said FHFA Acting Director Edward DeMarco. “The goal of this joint initiative is to explore alternative models for single-family mortgage servicing compensation that...

Mortgage lenders originated a significantly higher share of new loan applications in 2010 than the year before, helping to offset a steep decline in consumer demand for mortgage credit, according to an Inside Mortgage Finance analysis of recently released Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data. The total volume of mortgage originations reported under HMDA fell 10.2 percent from 2009 to 2010, ending with $1.576 trillion. Although refinance transactions accounted for 67.1 percent of total HMDA originations last year, the refi market bore the brunt of the downturn, with the dollar volume of refinance production...(Includes one data chart)

The Federal Housing Finance Agency found itself on the defensive this week following a rapid-fire series of highly critical reports issued by its inspector general that questioned the agency’s capacity to oversee Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac effectively, as well as its decisions in specific cases. The FHFA Office of Inspector General said late last week that the FHFA’s examination program, the primary means by which it supervises and regulates the government-sponsored enterprises, faces “capacity and transparency shortfalls.” “The agency has too few examiners to ensure the efficiency and effectiveness of...

The supply of mortgage debt outstanding continued to decline in the second quarter of 2011, reaching levels not seen in nearly five years. The Federal Reserve reported that single-family mortgage debt totaled $10.396 trillion as of the end of June, down 0.5 percent from the end of the previous quarter. It marked the 13th consecutive quarterly decline in the mortgage servicing business, which has shrunk by $783.2 billion since peaking in the first quarter of 2008 at $11.179 trillion. The only sector of the market that’s growing is the Ginnie Mae program, where the supply of the agency’s single-family mortgage securities...(Includes one data chart)

Home-purchase mortgage lending continues to sputter along in 2011 and lender hopes of any increased mortgage production in the months ahead remain focused on declining mortgage rates and the refinance sector – and not the listless housing market. According to numbers compiled by Inside Mortgage Finance, home-purchase mortgage originations totaled an anemic $209 billion in the first half of this year – the lowest level seen in more than a decade. While weak home sales in 2011 are the major reason for the low home-purchase mortgage activity, another big factor is the prevalence of cash purchases in the current housing market. Results from...(Includes one data chart)