The Department of Housing and Urban Development will integrate risk management efforts as soon as the agency’s new Office of Risk Management (ORM) is up and running, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. Although the report provides no timeline, it said that HUD has indicated a willingness to adopt changes the GAO recommended to speed up the implementation of an overall risk management strategy. The FHA needs to reassure Congress that it has the proper controls in place to minimize financial risks arising from increased reliance on FHA mortgage insurance, the GAO said. Lawmakers are concerned that ...

Legislation that would keep VA funding fees at their current levels through FY 2016 was sent this week to President Obama for signature. The House of Representatives passed the bill, H.R. 674, the 3 Percent Withholding Repeal and Job Creation Act of 2011, on Nov. 16, with amendments from the Senate. The Senate approved the bill on Nov. 10. The president is expected to sign the bill. However, if the bill is not signed by Nov. 18, funding fees will decrease as scheduled for a short period, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs in a published guidance to VA lenders. If funding fees do reset to the lower amounts ...

Finding itself in one of the largest mortgage fraud cases ever prosecuted by the federal government, the Department of Housing and Urban Development may have a hard time explaining why it failed to act earlier against a lender that scammed the FHA for nearly a decade. It appears HUD, notwithstanding its assertions of increased vigilance and aggressive enforcement against violators of department regulations, dropped the ball on Allied Home Mortgage Corp. According to a lawsuit filed by the U.S. Attorney in Manhattan district court this week, Allied, an FHA loan correspondent, and its two top executives engaged in ...

FHA originations dropped while the rest of the mortgage market, powered by a new wave of refinancing, posted gains during the third quarter, according to an Inside FHA Lending analysis of agency originations data. FHA lenders reported an estimated $145.7 billion in direct endorsements in the third quarter, down 3.7 percent from the previous quarter. This was in stark contrast to VA loan production, which was up an impressive 31.0 percent to $20.7 billion, and new single-family securitization by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which rose 14.4 percent to $177.2 billion over the same period. Even the private mortgage insurance sector, FHA’s direct competitor, outdid ... [Includes one data chart]

Allowing direct lenders in the Farm Credit System to participate in FHA mortgage insurance programs as approved mortgagees and lenders may not present a true picture of credit availability in rural areas and could end up costing taxpayers, the Mortgage Bankers Association warned. In a recent letter to HUD’s Office of Lender Activities and Program Compliance, the MBA added that the proposal may be in conflict with the administration’s goal of reducing government participation in the housing finance market. Steve O’Connor, MBA senior vice president, said Farm Credit loans with their implicit government guarantee and FHA-insured loans with their explicit government warranty would ...

Home Equity Conversion Mortgage lenders may now use certain financial assessment criteria in qualifying consumers for a HECM loan prior to FHA’s publication of its own guidance. Officials from the Department of Housing and Urban Development broke the news during the recent National Reverse Mortgage Lenders Association annual conference in Boston. They said the new underwriting assessment tool would help ensure borrowers can pay required taxes and insurance on their homes. The notification followed the unveiling of the NRMLA’s recommended underwriting guidance. In a previous email notice to industry participants, Acting Assistant Secretary of Housing/FHA Commissioner Carol Galante indicated that ...

Rep. Jeff Miller, R-FL, chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, reportedly has instructed his staff to start looking into allegations that a number of mortgage lending institutions charged illegal fees to veterans who refinanced their homes. Committee staff members reportedly met with Department of Veterans Affairs officials to discuss the allegations, which were made public earlier this month by a federal court in Atlanta. “I will reserve judgment on the appropriate next course of action, to include the potential for a full Committee hearing, after having the opportunity to review the results of the staff investigation,” Miller said in a letter to Rep. Bruce Braley of Iowa, the ranking Democrat on the committee’s subcommittee on economic opportunity.

Several large banks and mortgage companies are accused of cheating military veterans and taxpayers out of millions of dollars by hiding illegal fees in VA refinance transactions and of deliberately misleading the government to obtain guarantees for the refinanced loans. Three law firms – Butler Wooten & Fryhofer and Wilbanks & Bridges in Atlanta and Phillips & Cohen in Washington, D.C. – have teamed up to pursue the “qui tam” or whistleblower lawsuit on behalf of two mortgage brokers and the U.S. government. The brokers, Victor Bibby and Brian Donnelly, brought the lawsuit under the False Claims Act, a federal law that goes back to the Civil War when it was used to ...

The Department of Veterans Affairs has issued guidance explaining the confusion in the last couple of weeks caused by conflicting VA regulations and legislation. The latest guidance from the VA, Circular 26-11-16, updates the method for calculating funding fees based on a provision in H.R. 2646, the Veterans Health Facilities Capital Improvement Act of 2011, which President Obama signed into law on Oct. 5. H.R. 2646, which sets funding for the construction of various VA medical facilities, also provides for higher funding fees for VA loans, contrary to funding fee changes announced by the VA on Sept. 8. Previous VA guidance notes ...

The House of Representatives has passed legislation that would give surviving spouses of fully disabled veterans access to VA home loans. The bill, H.R. 120, the Disabled Veterans’ Surviving Spouses Home Loans Act, is part of H.R. 2433, the Veterans Opportunity to Work Act, which the House overwhelmingly approved on Oct. 12 by a vote of 418 to 6. H.R. 2433 contains six pieces of veteran legislation designed to address veteran unemployment. Introduced by Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-NC, H.R. 120 aims to allay concerns of veterans with permanent and total disabilities about where their surviving spouses would live should the veteran die of causes unrelated to their military service. Under current law, a surviving spouse may qualify for a VA home loan only if the service member’s death is determined to be related to service disabilities. Otherwise, the surviving spouse qualifies only for ...