Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Johnson, D-SD, and Ranking Member Mike Crapo, R-ID, are drafting their own housing finance reform/GSE bill that likely will be superimposed over the Corker-Warner measure.

Mel Watt has quickly endeared himself to lenders, home builders and Realtors by delaying (scrapping?) Ed DeMarco's g-fee hike. As for Mr. DeMarco...

The irony cannot be missed: the mortgage insurance sector is profitable again, but its trade group likely will fold.

New FHFA Director Mel Watt is expected to shakeup some of the senior staff at the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

If elected, Savitt hopes to serve on the House Financial Services Committee. A past annual president of the National Association of Mortgage Brokers, he formed NAIHP five years ago.

The tapering of the Federal Reserve’s quantitative easing beginning this month will do little to end the advantages agency MBS have over new jumbo MBS.

In fact, the ATR rule “does not require lenders to offer any specific type of mortgage,” the guide says. “Lenders can offer any mortgage they believe a consumer has the ability to repay, as long as they have documentation to back up their assessment.”

Among other things, Fitch sees the compliance/cost squeeze leading to a wave of industry consolidation in the mortgage servicing industry.

However, a year-over-year look at the data shows a much poorer performance across the board, with overall grievances up 42 percent at Dec. 31, 2013, versus year-end 2012.

Realtors to Make Another Appeal to CFPB Leadership. The National Association of Realtors plans to host CFPB Director Richard Cordray and other housing policy experts Tuesday, Jan. 7, to discuss the effects the bureau’s game-changing mortgage rules will have on lenders, consumers and the overall housing market. Chief among the focal points of discussion will be the bureau’s new ability-to-repay/qualified mortgage rule, which establishes strong consumer protections that aim to ensure qualified homebuyers have access to...