State regulators are seeking comments regarding a number of potential changes to the Nationwide Multistate Licensing System and Registry licensing forms and the mortgage call report. Among other issues, state regulators are working to continue state adoption of the MCR as the sole activity reporting requirement for state-regulated lenders. About 14,500 companies fill out the MCR each quarter, detailing originations and other metrics. The State Regulatory Registry, which operates nationwide systems for state regulators, said compliance with the MCR remains a concern. “Compliance has steadily improved...

Underwriting standards, not a lack of income or significant student loan debt, have held back originations of mortgages to first-time homebuyers in recent years, according to industry analysts. As lenders gradually loosen their underwriting standards, originations of mortgages for first-time homebuyers are expected to increase in the coming years. In a recent brief, analysts at Capital Economics stressed that there doesn’t appear to have been a fundamental shift in homeownership aspirations, even though housing is currently slightly over-valued compared with renting. “There is...

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Richard Cordray continues to tell the mortgage industry and its allies in Congress that the CFPB will not look the other way while the industry grapples with implementation of the integrated mortgage disclosure rule. The director’s latest official rebuff was delivered in a recent letter to Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer, R-MO, who has been pressing the director for some kind of an enforcement grace period. Cordray historically has been...

Residential mortgages held in portfolio would be granted safe-harbor qualified-mortgage status under draft regulatory relief legislation circulated early this week by Sen. Richard Shelby, R-AL, chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee. To get that classification, the lender would have to hold the loan in portfolio from inception, and any person acquiring the loan must continue to hold it in portfolio. The loan cannot provide for negative amortization or interest-only payments, and the loan term could not exceed 30 years. Also, the lender would still have...

It’s no secret that pricing on lender-paid mortgage insurance policies has come down over the past several months and now it appears the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau may take a look at what’s going on behind the curtain. According to industry officials who claim to have knowledge of the situation, the powerful consumer regulator may focus on whether there is some kind of quid pro quo going on between lenders and mortgage insurers. In particular, the agency may look...

The three latest deals have a combined UPB of $820 million. Successful votes to terminate servicers of non-agency MBS are uncommon...

Although the FHA has been losing ground for several years to the private MIs, the program saw a surge in refis in March...

To date, the FHFA has received 1,300 comment letters on the proposed ban on captive insurance firms.

A CFPB lending exam can take up to six months to complete and can be quite expensive over time...

Plenty of attendees at NAR were steamed that after CFPB Director Richard Cordray made his remarks about TRID that he left the meeting without taking a single question from the audience.