In its thirst to expand further into financial services, IBM recently agreed to buy blue-chip advisory firm Promontory Financial Group, but there are two units that “Big Blue” won’t be getting: Promontory MortgagePath LLC and Promontory Interfinancial. According to industry officials, both units will continue to be owned (at least in part) by PFG founder Eugene Ludwig, the former Comptroller of the Currency who started the firm in 2001. Promontory Interfinancial is considered...

Many participants in the mortgage industry remain concerned that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau did not address additional cure provisions in its proposed rulemaking to clarify the integrated consumer disclosure known as TRID. Lenders would love to see the bureau respond to these concerns when it finalizes its so-called TRID 2.0 rule. But that might not happen without Congress getting involved. During a webinar last week sponsored by Inside Mortgage Finance, some attendees inquired...

Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data released last week show a somewhat more efficient mortgage market in 2015 as fewer loan applications were declined and more turned into originated loans. Lenders processed $2.576 trillion in mortgage applications filed in 2015, converting them into $1.651 trillion in purchase and refinance originations, a 32.9 percent increase from the previous year. Some 56.5 percent of loan apps turned into closed loans, up from 53.8 percent in 2014, and the overall denial rate fell 2.9 points to 20.1 percent. Most of last year’s origination surge came...[Includes one data table]

Rank-and-file mortgage lending industry participants continue to submit to the CFPB a range of problems and issues they are encountering with the bureau’s Truth in Lending Act/Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act Integrated Disclosure Rule, commonly known as TRID, and its clarifying rulemaking.One credit union official wrote that members (and borrowers served by community banks) are being coached by loan officers to “be patient and trust” that their final fees will be lower than what is shown on the loan estimate (LE). And the larger issue is that consumers are becoming less engaged in understanding their finances due to the complexities of the rule, she said. “Somehow, in trying to make lending conditions better for the consumer, something far worse ...

One of the fascinating things about sifting through all of the 1,200+ industry comments on the CFPB’s TRID clarifying proposed rulemaking as they are posted on the regulations.gov website is to notice the success the American Land Title Association and its membership are having in flooding the agency’s inbox with their concerns. The overwhelming majority of individual comment letters submitted to the CFPB to date all start with the same introductory language, including the reproduction of a typo, as follows: “I am [sic] title insurance professional and I am contacting you today about the proposed rulemaking on TRID. As a settlement agent, it’s important that I am not penalized for compliance errors made by a lender.” This suggests that commenters ...

With the one-year anniversary of the CFPB’s TRID rule now upon us, a new survey from the American Land Title Association finds that a vast swath of the homebuying population is either confused or feels taken advantage of by the calculation of title insurance fees on the new mortgage disclosures. Among the survey’s chief findings, 40 percent of consumers are confused by the new closing disclosure calculation of title insurance. “Under TRID, consumers are disclosed a price for their two title insurance policies that is different than the actual price they will pay at closing,” ALTA said. Also, homeowners want a detailed breakdown of all the costs for a service, the survey found. “At the closing table, homebuyers expect the ...

Official regulatory reviews for compliance with the CFPB’s TILA/RESPA Integrated Disclosure Rule are now underway at the bureau and among the prudential regulators, according to top industry attorneys. Speaking during a webinar last week sponsored by Inside Mortgage Finance, former CFPB official Benjamin Olson, now a partner with the BuckleySandler law firm in Washington, DC, stated, “We can confirm that, yes, the CFPB and the other regulators, as part of their mortgage origination exams, are including TRID modules and looking at TRID compliance.” He reminded the audience that the bureau has been emphatic that these will be diagnostic reviews. “I haven’t seen anything inconsistent with that with respect to the reviews of our clients out of the CFPB,” Olson said...

The CFPB has formally authorized the collection of expanded Home Mortgage Disclosure Act information on race and ethnicity, as per the Equal Credit Opportunity Act and Regulation B, in 2017. “At any time from Jan. 1, 2017, through Dec. 31, 2017, a creditor may, at its option, permit applicants to self-identify using disaggregated ethnic and racial categories as instructed in appendix B to Regulation C, as amended by the 2015 HMDA final rule,” the bureau said in a Sept. 29, 2016, notice in the Federal Register. During this period, a lender permitting applicants to self-identify using these categories shall not be deemed to violate Regulation B Section 1002.5(b). Further, the lender shall also be deemed to be in compliance with ...

CFPB Director Richard Cordray appeared before credit union representatives recently and touted the performance of their industry’s mortgage operations under the bureau’s mortgage rules. “Our first set of mortgage rules have been in place for over two and a half years, and we are seeing great progress,” Cordray told the National Association of Federal Credit Unions. “In 2014, the first year of our ability-to-repay rule on mortgage origination, owner-occupied home purchase mortgages increased by 4 percent, according to HMDA data, and growth was even stronger last year: home purchase mortgages increased by an estimated 13 percent to 14 percent.” In fact, as it turns out, the mortgage industry overall actually did slightly better than Cordray said. According to analysis of ...

Mortgage lending at community banks rose last year and is up over the last few years, according to a joint survey by the Federal Reserve and the Conference of State Bank Supervisors. However, that trend may not hold, thanks in part to a drop in demand and to a departure from the sector because of the CFPB’s mortgage rules. “Mortgage lending grew by more than 6 percent for community banks in our survey, which was somewhat higher than the comparable growth rate for all community banks over an overlapping period,” the agencies said. It was also higher than the comparable rate across the entire industry. Over a more-extended period, from December 2013 to March 2016, growth in 1-4 family residential ...