USMI Names MGIC Chief as Chairman. U.S. Mortgage Insurance has tapped Patrick Sinks, chief executive of MGIC Investment Corp., to be the trade group’s new chairman. Sinks succeeds USMI Chairman Rohit Gupta, president and CEO of Genworth Mortgage Insurance. Sinks served previously as USMI’s vice chairman. Bradley Shuster, chairman/chief executive for NMI Holdings, will take overNew Reverse-Mortgage Product. California Mortgage Advisors has expanded its reverse-mortgage menu, with the addition of a non-FHA reverse mortgage option of up to $6 million for select clients. With the new product, CMA joins a handful of private reverse-mortgage lenders that will consider properties valued up to $6 million. Last year, American Advisors Group, the largest Home Equity Conversion Mortgage lender, announced its AAG Advantage lending program, which features the ...
As of press time, it’s not clear whether the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will release its proposed rule clarifying certain aspects of its Truth in Lending Act/Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act Integrated Disclosure Rule – TRID – before the end of July, the agency’s original timeframe. Joe Ventrone, vice president and deputy chief for regulatory affairs at the National Association of Realtors, said his organization is now looking at an August release and does not anticipate major changes. “However, the CFPB will put in writing all previous informal guidance [it has] given heretofore,” he said. “I think all the guidance will be important if it gives lenders and vendors comfort against enforcement reprisals.” NAR is...
As federal programs to help underwater borrowers are phased out, government agencies want the mortgage industry to pick up where it left off to help troubled homeowners avoid foreclosure. They suggested that future programs be accessible, affordable, sustainable, transparent and have sufficient accountability. The Federal Housing Finance Agency, Department of Treasury, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development released a report this week that discussed what future loss mitigation programs should look like and lessons learned. The Home Affordable Modification Program and related federal initiatives will sunset at the end of 2016. “With the formal end of the crisis-era programs, the mortgage servicing industry will shoulder...
Small community lenders such as banks and credit unions not only have remained active in the mortgage servicing space under the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s mortgage-servicing rules, their market share of 13 percent in 2015 was double what it was in 2008 after the financial crisis, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. The largest community banks and credit unions accounted for most of the growth in the share of servicing by community banks and credit unions, the report said. Many of the representatives from 16 community lenders that GAO interviewed said...
The Democratic Party wants to expand programs to prevent foreclosure, increase access to affordable housing and preserve the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage, according to its recently released 2016 platform. “Whereas the Republican Presidential nominee rooted for the housing crisis, Democrats will continue to fight for those families who suffered the loss of their homes,” the document says. “We will help those who are working toward a path of financial stability and will put sustainable homeownership into the reach of more families.” Democrats want...
Class-action plaintiffs might not be assured of a final victory despite a favorable jury verdict in the wake of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit’s affirmation of district courts’ power to decertify a class even after a jury verdict. Industry attorneys say that the court’s recent ruling in Mazzei v. The Money Store means that defendants can obtain decertification of a class action not only leading up to trial, but even after a jury verdict in favor of the class. In Mazzei, the Second Circuit reaffirmed...
In a warning to other lenders on the importance of proper vendor oversight, the CFPB recently brought a$10 million enforcement action against Santander Bank, based in Wilmington, DE, because of its allegedly illegal overdraft services practices. Among the practices at issue, the bureau said the bank signed up consumers for overdraft services without their consent. “In some instances, Santander’s telemarketerbriefly described [the bank’s] Account Protector [service] to consumers, then asked for the last four digits of their Social Security numbers, and enrolled them without their consent,” said the CFPB. “In other instances, consumers said they did not want to enroll but requested information about the overdraft service, but the telemarketer enrolled them anyway,” the bureau added. Also, call ...
RSS