Inside Mortgage Finance

Interest Rate Increases Push More Loans into Subprime Bucket, Fed HMDA Analysis Finds

Mortgage lenders reported more subprime loans in their Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data in 2005 – a trend that the Federal Reserve Board says reflects the impact of rising interest rates and a flatter yield curve. But that explanation isn’t washing with community advocates who say that wide price disparities evident in the data show discrimination is alive and well in the mortgage market. At issue are “rate-spread” mortgages, identified in the HMDA regulations as first-lien loans with annual percentage rates that... Read More

Conventional Purchase-Money Loans Led Substantial Gains in Mortgage Originations Last Year, HMDA Data Reveal

A boom in conventional mortgage lending spurred a strong 11.4 percent increase in mortgage originations in 2005, according to an Inside Mortgage Finance analysis of recently released Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data for last year. Federal banking regulators late last week released data showing $2.715 trillion in home loan originations reported under HMDA in 2005. Analysts generally agree that HMDA originations data understate the total market because some lenders and remote geographic markets... [Includes select HMDA data.] Read More

Mortgage Delinquency Rates Creep Higher in Second Quarter of 2006 for Most Lenders

Mortgage delinquency rates edged higher in nearly every category during the second quarter of 2006 in an industry that is seeing a flood of alternative mortgage products begin to season in a cooling housing market. According to the Inside Mortgage Finance Large Servicer Delinquency Index, the overall late payment rate spiked from 2.97 percent in the first quarter to 3.41 percent as of the end of June. That was the highest reading in the series since the end of 2005. The biggest increase in late... [Includes full-page chart.] Read More

Management Shake-up at Countrywide as Industry’s Top Lender Tries to Shore up Eroding Market Share

Countrywide Financial, the nation’s largest mortgage producer and servicer, abruptly announced late last week that it is replacing its president and COO. Significantly, the management shakeup comes at the same time Countrywide’s two-year-old dominance of the mortgage industry is starting to show some strain in 2006.On the management front, Stanford Kurland, a 28-year veteran at Countrywide and one-time heir apparent to co-founder, Chairman and CEO Angelo Mozilo, was replaced as president and chief oper-ating officer by David Sambol, a seasoned executive who observers called more polished and dynamic than his predecessor. Read More

Reverse Mortgage Market Booming, Still in ‘Infancy’ According to FHA

After sinking to historically dismal lows, the FHA saw a modest rebound in market share early this year and has pinned its hopes for revival on Congress giving it higher loan limits and improved product flexibility. But with no public fanfare, the only FHA program that’s showing any life at all is the agency’s home-equity conversion mortgage – a product that echoes the agency’s long-forgotten role as market innovator. From October 2005 through the middle of August... Read More

Prospects for GSE Reform Seem to Brighten on Capitol Hill; OFHEO to Ratchet up Pressure on Fannie Executives

Prospects for compromise on legislation to overhaul the regulation of housing-related government-sponsored enterprises took a sudden favorable turn this week, as a leading GSE hawk in the Senate blinked on a key issue. Sen. Richard Shelby, R-AL, chairman of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, this week unexpectedly indicated he is willing to move the long-stalled GSE reform bill forward without strict limits on retained portfolios at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac... Read More

Industry Expects ‘Major Challenges’ if Frank Assumes Leadership of House Financial Panel

The Mortgage Bankers Association has peered into the uncertain balance of power in the new Congress that will be chosen in a few weeks and seen Massachusetts liberal Rep. Barney Frank holding the gavel for the all-important House Financial Services Committee. Though the national mid-term elections are still two months away, the MBA is preparing for the possibility that the Democrats could recapture the majority in the 109th Congress. That would make Frank, now the ranking minority member of the committee, the leading... Read More