Eleven lenders paid a total of $152.1 million in civil penalties and settlements while three others lost their FHA approval for various violations of FHA requirements, according to the Mortgagee Review Board’s latest report on administrative actions taken against FHA-approved lenders. As required by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the report summarizes the disciplinary actions imposed by the board on FHA lenders from Oct. 1, 2014, to Sept. 30, 2015. These actions include $151.7 million in settlements and $370,119 in civil money penalties, withdrawals of FHA approval, suspensions, probations and reprimands. Allied First Bank of Oswego, IL, agreed to pay a $17,000 civil money penalty for improper use of FHA’s name in certain correspondence and for failure to notify HUD of a consent order entered into by the bank and federal and state banking regulators. The MRB voted to ...

A California-based mortgage lender and six senior executives have agreed to pay $12.7 million to the Securities and Exchange Commission to resolve allegations they schemed to defraud investors in the sale of residential mortgage-backed securities with a Ginnie Mae guarantee. The SEC complaint alleged that, from March 2011 to March 2015, Ginnie Mae issuer First Mortgage Corp. and its top executives pulled current performing loans out of Ginnie Mae MBS. The issuer falsely claimed that the loans were delinquent so that it could recycle them as newly issued MBS and sell them at a profit. FMC allegedly issued Ginnie Mae MBS prospectuses with false and misleading information by using a Ginnie Mae rule that allowed issuers to repurchase seriously delinquent loans. In addition, the SEC complaint alleged that FMC deliberately delayed depositing checks from borrowers who had been behind on ...

The former Wells LO added: “I was bullied into entering the consent order because the CFPB left me no other reasonable choice.”

The FDIC said that acting as a receiver of the failed banks it “may professionals and entities whose conduct resulted in losses to those institutions…”

At the KBW show, MI firms also dismissed the notion of consolidation in the sector, calling it unlikely.

A strong spring home-buying season and continued low rates are feeding optimism among selected lenders, fueling hopes that healthy production in May will lead to an even better June, according to interviews conducted by Inside Mortgage Finance. “May was bigger than April by 10 to 15 percent at both Skyline and New Leaf,” said Bill Dallas, CEO of Skyline Lending, Calabasas, CA. (New Leaf is the wholesale affiliate.) Not too long ago, Dallas wasn’t feeling all that optimistic about 2016. But that was then. “The year started out...

Wells Fargo, the nation’s top-ranked mortgage lender, appears to have escaped unscathed from the scrutiny the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau directed toward a former loan officer, an investigation which resulted in an $85,000 fine and a one-year ban from working in the mortgage industry. Last week, the CFPB announced a consent order with David Eghbali, formerly an LO for Wells’ Wilshire Crescent branch in Beverly Hills, CA, from November 2007 through July 2015. The bureau accused him of referring a substantial number of loan closings to a single escrow company, New Millennium Escrow, Inc., which allegedly shifted its fees from some customers to others at his request. “In exchange for the flexibility to shift fees from some loans to others, respondent [Eghbali] referred...

A dispute over rule interpretation between the Department of Housing and Urban Development and its inspector general regarding the use of gift funds and premium pricing in downpayment assistance has FHA lenders concerned about potential liability and unnecessary legal costs. Last week, HUD Deputy Secretary/FHA Commissioner Edward Golding sought to allay lender concerns by refuting the IG’s position on lender use of downpayment assistance programs sponsored by state housing finance agencies. In a memo to the industry, Golding upheld...

Wells Fargo and JPMorgan Chase recently launched programs to deliver low-downpayment mortgages to Fannie Mae that differ from the government-sponsored enterprises’ recent expansion into high loan-to-value financing. Both banks introduced new 97 percent LTV programs they believe are easier to use than the GSE initiatives and, for certain borrowers, a better choice than FHA financing. Wells Fargo’s “yourFirstMortgage” requires a minimum of 3 percent downpayment for fixed-rate mortgages. The company will consider FICO scores significantly lower than other similar high-LTV programs, to as low as 620, along with debt-to-income ratios up to 45 percent. Factoring in nontraditional uses of credit such as rent, utility bill payments and tuition is...

Mortgage servicers appeared to have received some protections in November when amendments to the Telephone Consumer Protection Act were signed into law. However, the rule proposed by the Federal Communications Commission to implement the amendments contravenes the law, according to one FCC commissioner. The TCPA allows for one errant call to a cell phone number that hasn’t provided consent before liabilities under the law are triggered. The Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 amended...