After being absent for about 10 years, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will re-enter the low-income housing tax credit market to support affordable rental housing, the Federal Housing Finance Agency announced late this week. But the GSEs’ market share will be capped so they’re not in direct competition with the private market, and their investments must meet certain requirements. Fannie and Freddie will have an annual investment limit of $500 million, which translates to less than a 5 percent market share for each, according to the FHFA. Moreover, any investments more than $300 million during any year must be in areas that have been identified by the FHFA as markets that have difficulty attracting investors.

Fannie Prices $1.2B CAS Deal. Fannie priced its seventh credit risk-sharing transaction of 2017 under its Connecticut Avenue Securities program. CAS Series 2017-C07, a $1.161 billion note offering, is scheduled to settle on Nov. 21, 2017, and is the final deal of the year. It was met with strong investor demand, including new investors, according to Laurel Davis, Fannie’s vice president of credit risk transfer. “Investors continue to provide us with positive feedback on the transparency we provide as part of our CAS program, including our response to recent hurricane events and the information we make available in Data Dynamics, our analytical tool for investors. We expect to continue regular benchmark issuance of CAS notes in 2018, subject as always to market conditions.”

Freddie said it plans to close its first investment in January 2018.

Fannie, Freddie and Ginnie continued to dominate multifamily activity…

Although Capital One is exiting single-family lending, the bank will continue to provide “specialized" multifamily financing...

Homebuilder finance is booming at Flagstar Bancorp...

While the pilot is limited to New Hampshire home buyers, Fannie thinks the pilot could open the door to other states doing something similar…

There’s still no word from the White House on when it will nominate industry executive David Kittle to be the next president of Ginnie Mae...

“Only two single-borrower, single-family rental securitizations posted a retention rate below 70.0 percent,” Morningstar said…

The biggest challenge for the vibrant single-family rental market may be the shortage of available homes to purchase, according to panelists speaking at an Urban Institute event highlighting institutional investment in SFRs this week. And one analyst pointed to mid-sized investors as being best positioned to profit from the market. Since the financial crisis, SFRs have emerged as a viable housing option and real estate investment firms are seizing the opportunity. Both mom-and-pop operators and institutional investors have been buying homes of all sizes and offering them as rental properties. Prior to the crisis, there were...