First-time homebuyers, looking to capitalize on low housing prices and even lower mortgage rates, have revved up their home shopping in recent months, according to the latest Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance HousingPulse Tracking Survey. And this is welcome news for a mortgage industry looking to jumpstart home purchase mortgage lending. But first-time homebuyers also face a number of speed bumps – if not roadblocks – in the current housing market. These range from tough mortgage underwriting requirements to increased competition from investors looking to snap up housing bargains – challenges that...

Although at least one Senate Republican shows interest in a plan to expand the Home Affordable Refinance Program, the outlook for Congressional action remains doubtful and House Democrats are pushing the Federal Housing Finance Agency to make further HARP changes administratively. During a Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee hearing last week on legislation to expand HARP, Sen. Bob Corker, R-TN, said he was open to the proposal. “I hope that we’ll have a real mark-up on this bill,” he said. Senate Democrats Robert Menendez (NJ) and Barbara Boxer (CA) have introduced legislation...

Nonbank venture capital funds that see opportunity in the expected pullback of banks from the $10 trillion mortgage servicing rights sector likely will not dodge the growing regulatory compliance burden that has become one motivation for banks to pull out of the business. Nationstar Mortgage Holdings, a unit of Fortress Investment Group that was taken public in March, is on pace to become the largest nonbank servicer in the industry if it succeeds in buying the mortgage servicing portfolio of GMAC Mortgage and Residential Capital. Nationstar CEO Jay Bray recently went on record saying he expects...

Guarantee fees on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac single-family mortgage-backed securities have been edging higher over the past year and in April took a 10 basis point leap higher, but the timetable for future increases is unclear. In April, the government-sponsored enterprises implemented a 10 bp increase in guarantee fees that was mandated by Congress as a way to pay for an extension of a cut in payroll taxes. All of the added revenue from the fee hike, which will remain in effect for 10 years, will go to the U.S. Treasury and not cover Fannie and Freddie credit losses or count toward the GSEs’ obligations...

Ginnie Mae issued $80.9 billion of single-family mortgage-backed securities during the first quarter of 2012, an increase of 6.8 percent from the previous three-month period. It was the highest production level for the program since the end of 2010 and reflected a surge in FHA and VA refinance originations. Ginnie MBS issuance was up 2.3 percent from the first quarter of last year. Wells Fargo stretched its industry-leading market share to 40.1 percent in the first quarter. The company issued $32.5 billion in Ginnie single-family securities, a gain of 14.0 percent from the end of 2011, or about...

Thanks to the ongoing domination of the MBS market by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae, securitization continued to fund the overwhelming majority of home loans originated during the first three months of 2012. A new Inside MBS & ABS analysis revealed that the volume of securitized newly-originated residential mortgages equaled a whopping 97.0 percent of home loans originated during the first quarter of this year. That came close to the record 99.7 percent securitization rate set back in the first quarter of last year. The delay between primary market origination...(Includes one data chart)

The Supreme Court of the United States last week sided with Quicken Loans while unanimously rejecting the legal arguments of two federal agencies in affirming a lower court’s determination that a plaintiff must prove a settlement fee was split by two or more persons in order to successfully stake a claim under the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act. The relevant portion of RESPA at issue in Freeman et al. v. Quicken Loans Inc. is the provision that “[n]o person shall give and no person shall accept any portion, split, or percentage of any charge made or received for the rendering of a...

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has proposed procedures it plans to use in exercising its supervisory and enforcement authority over how nonbank consumer financial service companies (like mortgage lenders and mortgage servicers) control their third-party vendors, such as subservicers, foreclosure trustees and law firms, and force-placed insurers. It’s all about controlling the potential risk to consumers. Under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, the CFPB has authority to supervise any nonbank that it has “reasonable cause” to determine is posing a risk...

In Hogan v. Washington Mutual Bank, N.A. et al, the Arizona high court has dismissed the ‘show me the note’ claim in foreclosure litigation, throwing out a legal argument often used to block an impending foreclosure. “We granted review to decide whether a trustee may foreclose on a deed of trust without the beneficiary first having to show ownership of the note that the deed secures,” explained Arizona Supreme Court Chief Justice Rebecca White Berch. “We hold that Arizona’s non-judicial foreclosure statutes do not require the beneficiary to prove its authority or...

Last week, the Federal Reserve Board put out action plans for Citigroup and HSBC Finance Corp. to correct deficiencies in their residential mortgage loan servicing and foreclosure processing. These enforcement actions require the mortgage servicing subsidiaries to provide appropriate remediation to borrowers who suffered financial injury as a result of errors by the servicers. The Fed also released the engagement letter between Ally Financial Inc. and its independent consultant to review foreclosures that were in the firm’s pipeline in 2009 and 2010...