Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mel Watt will be on the hot seat next week when he is slated to testify before the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee. The oversight hearing – titled “The Federal Housing Finance Agency: Balancing Stability, Growth, and Affordability in the Mortgage Market” has Watt listed as the only witness when the committee convenes on Wed., Nov. 19, at 10 a.m.

The Mortgage Bankers Association is calling on the Federal Housing Finance Agency to direct Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to review “and if appropriate” adopt new validated credit score models and allow for the use of alternative methods of scoring. In a letter last week to FHFA Director Mel Watt, the MBA said that, through this action, the Finance Agency could directly increase the number of borrowers eligible for conventional mortgages.

Ohio Court Sides With Freddie in Pre-Crisis Shareholder Lawsuit. An Ohio federal court late last week tossed out a shareholder class action lawsuit that accused Freddie Mac of lying about its exposure to subprime loans prior to the 2008 financial crisis. The suit, filed in 2008 by the Ohio Public Employees Retirement System, claimed that Freddie artificially inflated the value of its common stock by making false public financial statements that obscured its subprime exposure.OPERS claimed it lost as much as $27.2 million as a result of Freddie’s alleged cover-up of its subprime exposure.

Reinstating the government-sponsored enterprises’ conventional 97 percent loan-to-value mortgage programs would benefit first-time homebuyers and borrowers with little or no cash reserves for a downpayment but adversely affect the FHA Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund, according to analysts. If limited to first-time homebuyers, a conventional 97 LTV loan would offer some new homeowners better home loan financing than FHA and provide greater access to mortgage credit, said analysts with Bank of America Merrill Lynch. For years, Fannie Mae offered conventional 97 LTV loans through its MyCommmunityMortgage to help first-time homebuyers purchase a home with only a 3 percent downpayment. It was a better alternative to FHA’s main product, which required a 3.5 percent downpayment. The Fannie product also had less ...

The Mortgage Bankers Association has formally called upon the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s official watchdog to reconsider some of its proposals meant to prevent the next multi-billion dollar fraud scheme against Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. In a letter dispatched to the FHFA’s Inspector General late last week, the MBA cited its opposition to certain recommendations the IG made to the Finance Agency in its August post-mortem on the swindle perpetrated by the now-defunct Taylor, Bean & Whitaker Mortgage.

FHFA’s Watt Promises a CEO for the CSP by Year-end. After a year of searching for a chief executive to lead Common Securitization Solutions, the Federal Housing Finance Agency is getting closer to picking a candidate for the job. Speaking at the annual convention of the Mortgage Bankers Association in Las Vegas last week, FHFA Director Mel Watt promised the industry that a CEO would be named by Dec. 31. The FHFA’s search firm is Spencer Stuart.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency may end up having second thoughts about its proposed housing goals for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac given the room for improvement industry members cited in comment letters to the agency. Issued by the FHFA in September, the proposal would increase some of the benchmark levels for Fannie’s and Freddie’s affordable housing goals through 2017, while also establishing new housing subgoals for low-income multifamily properties.

Late this week, Ocwen Financial Corp. announced that it has set aside $100 million for a possible regulatory settlement with the New York Department of Financial Services, a move that couldn’t come too soon for the troubled “high-touch” servicer. But the company also cautioned that a settlement with the NYDFS is hardly a sure thing. More-over, some Ocwen watchers believe a deal with New York could spur other state regulators to take action against the company. One consultant who has done work for Ocwen told...

While the FHA’s share of the primary insurance market has dropped significantly since premiums were hiked in early 2013, the VA program and the rural housing loan program run by the Department of Agriculture are going strong, according to agency officials. During a panel discussion at the Mortgage Bankers Association annual convention this week, VA and Rural Development executives said that both agencies have been quietly building mortgage market share. Jeffrey London, deputy director of the VA’s loan guaranty service, reported that purchase-mortgage VA loan originations were up 11 percent in fiscal 2014, with 40 percent of the business being first-time homebuyers. Of that group, 80 percent took no-downpayment VA loans, the biggest selling point in the program, along with its relatively low costs. In earlier remarks, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julian Castro revealed that ...

The FHA warned it would soon be sending notices to lenders who are overdue in completing their annual recertification packages, a rule violation that could land them before the Mortgagee Review Board for disciplinary action. Lenders who were unable to submit their recertification packages containing the required financial reports, annual recertification statements and the renewal fee payment will be receiving notices of deficiency from the FHA. FHA extended the filing deadline to June 27, 30 days after the deployment of the new Lender Electronic Assessment Portal (LEAP) system used in the lender recertification process. Traditionally, lenders were required to access both FHA Connection and Lender Assessment Sub-System (LASS) to complete the annual recertification process. LEAP will now enable lenders to complete all ...