Industry representatives are making headway in obtaining clarification from the Federal Reserve on various aspects of the agency’s controversial regulation on loan originator compensation. But there are a number of key questions that still have to be addressed, and until they are, lenders need to proceed carefully, according to a top official at one of the nation’s largest mortgage lenders. One area in which the industry needs clarification has to do with compensation based on “time spent” as it pertains to different loan programs and products, and whether compensation can be established on a loan-by-loan basis or by...

The Consumer Finance Protection Bureau generated a lot of press last week when it released two new prototype mortgage disclosure forms that are noticeably more user-friendly for borrowers than those currently in use under the Truth in Lending Act and the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act...

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency recently released a letter on preemption maintaining that, under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, its 2004 preemption rule still applies to national banks...

A new survey from ING DIRECT has found that 56 percent of homebuyers do not use the Good Faith Estimate as it was intended - to shop around and compare mortgage offers to get the best possible deal...

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Two Leadership Hires Made. Harvard University Professor of Economics Sendhil Mullainathan has been hired to serve as assistant director for research at the CFPB...

There is "not even a whiff of a hint of a compromise" between Congressional Republicans and President Obama and his fellow Democrats in Congress over the possible appointment of Harvard law professor Elizabeth Warren to be director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, according to some industry insiders...

Congressional Republicans are doing just about everything they can- short of calling on U.S. Navy SEAL Team 6 - to weaken, throttle, starve or deep-six the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau before it gets up to full speed...

A handful of Congressional Democrats aren't letting the prospect that legislation they are sponsoring may go nowhere in committee keep them from trying to toughen the terms of the regulatory debate over national servicer standards...

The U.S. Supreme Court last week called upon the Solicitor General for advice on whether the high court should review a case involving allegations that Quicken Loans obtained unearned "loan discount fees" in some mortgage loan transactions in Louisiana, contrary to Section 8(b) of the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act...

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., as the receiver of Washington Mutual, earlier this month sued Lender Processing Services of Jacksonville, FL, and CoreLogic of Santa Ana, CA, and their corporate parents and affiliates for a combined $283.5 million, alleging gross negligence and breach of contract related to appraisals performed for hundreds of the defunct lender's mortgages between 2006 and 2008...