Morningstar Credit Ratings proposed new criteria this week to rate residential MBS. The rating service published similar criteria in May but Morningstar has only rated one deal backed by new residential mortgages since then. The biggest addition in the proposed criteria details how Morningstar plans to handle transactions that include primary mortgage insurance. The provision could help Morningstar rate risk-sharing transactions from the government-sponsored enterprises. The rating service said...
American Homes 4 Rent, the largest publicly traded player in the single-family rental market, late this week agreed to buy American Residential Properties in a deal valued at $1.5 billion. It was the second transaction involving real estate investment trusts in the SFR sector within three months, and has sparked talk of further consolidation, including perhaps mortgage REITs. A research note from Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, penned right before the AH4R-ARP combination was unveiled, noted that mergers in the space are possible “given current valuation discounts ….” In other words, the share prices of single-family rental REITs have been...
The Mortgage Bankers Association is urging the Federal Housing Finance Agency to incorporate more explicit up-front risk-sharing goals in the soon-to-be released 2016 Scorecard that dictates GSE activities for the year. The MBA touts the advantages of using mortgage insurers, and said in a letter addressed to FHFA Director Mel Watt that the MI approach would be the most accessible for the vast majority of lenders. The trade group emphasized that
In the ongoing Fairholme Funds v. The United States case, Judge Margaret Sweeney recently denied Fannie Mae’s motion to quash or invalidate a subpoena issued by the plaintiff’s counsel. As part of the discovery phase, Fairholme Funds asked that Egbert Perry, appointed chairman of the noard of Fannie in 2014 and board member since 2008, be called to testify in the case. In the motion, Fannie and Perry argued that based upon the discovery conducted so far, deposing Perry is “unnecessary and burdensome.” The court rejected that and other arguments made to relieve Perry of testifying. In the November order, Judge Sweeney said that the court permitted discovery in this case to ensure that plaintiffs would have every opportunity to...
Quicken Loans recently launched a new, TRID-friendly product dubbed the “rocket mortgage,” so named because “in the eight minutes it takes a space shuttle to reach orbit, Americans will now be able to receive a full mortgage approval online,” the lender says in its marketing pitch. “Rocket Mortgage simplifies the largest, most complex and important financial transaction most consumers experience in their lifetime,” said Linglong He, chief information officer for the lender ...
Mortgage employment has risen by just over 5 percent the past year while loan production is on track to increase 33 percent from 2014 – a sign that residential lenders continue to hire as few workers as possible and use outsourcing firms. According to interviews conducted by Inside Mortgage Trends over the past week, it appears that demand for experienced loan officers will remain strong in the coming year, but servicing staffs will continue to shrink. Mortgage recruiter ...
Loan modifications and other loss mitigation efforts continued to decline in the third quarter as mortgage performance improved. Servicers still face pressure on loss mitigation efforts, particularly with the Home Affordable Modification Program. Some 98,074 loan mods were completed in the third quarter of 2015, according to data released by Hope Now this week. Mod activity declined by 18.0 percent compared with the previous quarter and was down 13.3 percent from a year ago ...
Commercial banks and savings institutions continued to backpedal away from the business of servicing residential mortgages for other investors during the third quarter, according to a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of bank call reports. Banks and thrifts serviced a total of $4.139 trillion of home mortgages for other investors at the end of September, most of them pooled in mortgage-backed securities. That was down 1.2 percent from June and off ... [Includes one data chart]
After several months of being in the test phase, Fannie Mae officially released its new loan delivery application on Dec. 1. The new platform was designed to be easier to navigate with enhanced reporting capabilities, greater transparency and improved edit management capabilities. Customers have had a chance to get familiar with the program and take advantage of an online tutorial since September. For those ready to fully implement the application, it’s up and running on Fannie’s website as of this week, but there’s still time to ease into it. Both the old and new loan delivery applications will be available during the transition period. Lenders...