The heavy role of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae in the post-crisis mortgage market has brought lower rates and considerable liquidity to the mortgage business, but industry leaders question whether private capital can meet the growing need to finance nonbank servicing portfolios and the eventual pullback of the Federal Reserve. “We wouldn’t have the same price we have now without the government being there; its programs provide a 2 to 3 percent discount,” said Stan Middleman, CEO of Freedom Mortgage Corp., during a panel session at the Mortgage Bankers Association’s secondary market conference this week. “They are the whole enchilada. If you took them out, we’d have nothing.” The government-sponsored enterprises are...

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau last week issued annotated versions of the loan estimate and closing disclosure forms that provide citations to the disclosure provisions in Chapter 2 of the Truth in Lending Act referenced in the integrated disclosure rule. However, neither of the two documents appear to go anywhere near providing the kind of clarity the industry hopes to get from the agency’s recently announced new TRID rulemaking. In fact, the documents are more notable for what they do not provide than for what they do. “This document does not include...

Frustrated by inaction on housing finance reform, a dozen conservative organizations led by the National Taxpayers Union called on Congress to begin recapitalizing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The coalition of center-right organizations urged Congress to pass H.R. 4913, the “Housing Finance Restructuring Act of 2016.” They said the Treasury sweep of the government-sponsored enterprises’ profits implemented in 2012 has “jeopardized” the financial system and taxpayers. “If there is one thing this presidential campaign has revealed, it is...

A paper recently published by the Treasury Department’s Office of Financial Research detailed links between changes in underwriting standards at banks and the banks’ loan application denial rates and mortgage performance. While the findings are intuitive, the paper from the OFR was the first to match individual lenders’ confidential responses to the Federal Reserve’s Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey with data from the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act. “We find...

Fannie Mae’s Economic & Strategic Research Group surveyed senior mortgage executives earlier this year and confirmed that lenders are still facing challenges in complying with the CFPB’s integrated disclosure rule known as TRID, according to new findings released by the government-sponsored enterprise last week. The controversial rule integrates the consumer disclosure requirements under the Truth in Lending Act and the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act. According to Sheila Teimourian, vice president and deputy counsel at Fannie, more than three-quarters of the lenders surveyed indicated that the two biggest challenges were managing or coordinating with third-party technology vendors and communicating with key players, such as the buyer, seller and loan officer. About eight in 10 of those who cited coordinating with ...

Analysts at Moody’s Investors Service believe that the Structured Finance Industry Group’s draft proposal on the CFPB’s integrated disclosure rule, otherwise known as TRID, generally is up to the task of addressing the relevant risks for U.S. residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS), notwithstanding the uncertainty associated with the pending clarifying rulemaking from the bureau. The rule merges the mortgage disclosures mandated by the Truth in Lending Act and the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act. “SFIG’s draft proposal to standardize the framework for reviewing and grading loans for TILA-RESPA Integrated Disclosure (TRID) rule compliance is adequate to identify those compliance risks that are likely to cause losses to RMBS trusts, aside from one grading provision with which we disagree,” said Moody’s Credit ...

Last week, in another apparent attempt to provide the mortgage lending industry with a bit more clarity when it comes to its TRID rule, the CFPB published on its website annotated versions of the Loan Estimate and Closing Disclosure that provide citations to the disclosure provisions in Chapter 2 of TILA referenced in the rule. However, neither of the two documents, which only number 14 pages between the two of them, appear to go anywhere near providing the kind of clarity the industry continues to hope for.According to Kristie Kully and David Tallman, both partners at the Mayer Brown law firm, these so-called “mapping forms” are unfortunately hamstrung by such extensive disclaimers that the bureau might as well have ...

More homebuyers are reviewing their mortgage documents prior to their real estate closing under the new disclosure regime brought into the marketplace by the CFPB’s integrated disclosure rule, according to the results of a new closing survey by the American Land Title Association. However, there are still issues related to better educating consumers and in terms of the industry’s compliance. “While there remain challenges to complying with the regulation, title and settlement agents went to great lengths to prepare and train staff about the new process,” said Michelle Korsmo, ALTA’s chief executive officer. “The hard work of these professionals paid off as our survey found that 92 percent of surveyed homebuyers are taking time to review their mortgage documents before ...

Mortgage lending continues to be a key priority for the CFPB’s Office of Fair Lending for supervision and enforcement, particularly Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data integrity and potential fair lending risks in the areas of redlining, underwriting and pricing, the bureau said in a new report. Last year, the bureau brought to an end two important public enforcement actions that had to do with mortgage lending. The first was a redlining case against Hudson City Savings Bank, which was required to pay almost $33 million in direct loan subsidies, funding for community programs and outreach, and a civil penalty. In this case, the CFPB accused Hudson City of providing unequal access to credit by structuring its business to avoid providing ...

Earlier this month, the CFPB finally issued its long-awaited proposed rule to drastically scale back the ability of consumer financial companies to use pre-dispute arbitration clauses in their contracts for consumer financial products and services. The proposed rule would impose two sets of limitations on the use of pre-dispute arbitration agreements by covered providers of consumer financial products and services. First, it would prohibit providers from using such an agreement to block consumer class actions in court and would require providers to insert language into their arbitration agreements reflecting this limitation. “This proposal is based on the bureau’s preliminary findings – which are consistent with [its earlier] study – that pre-dispute arbitration agreements are being widely used to prevent consumers from seeking ...