Debt-for-equity, a strategy commonly used in buyout deals among companies in Europe, is being floated as an idea to help underwater U.S. homeowners and the lenders avoid taking bigger losses if the mortgage ends up going to foreclosure. In a debt-for-equity arrangement, the borrower would refinance an underwater mortgage for a new loan that reflects the house’s current market value as an alternative to going to foreclosure. In return for reducing the loan amount, the lender takes an equity position that allows it to share in any future house price appreciation.Proponents say...

The Federal Housing Finance Agency is looking for public input on two separate proposals that could change the way Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac servicers are compensated.This week, the FHFA issued a discussion paper detailing proposed alternatives for a GSE servicing compensation model that will benefit servicers, consumers and investors.

A majority of Americans say that they would be unable to pay their mortgage if they lose their jobs. According to a new Country Financial survey, 68 percent of homeowners say that, were they laid off, they wouldn’t have the means to continue paying their mortgages after nine months. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics from August 2011 place average length of unemployment at slightly under 10 months, meaning that most Americans could be a pink slip away from delinquency. For some, the situation is more ominous. Slightly less than a third of Americans – 31 percent – say that they would only be able to continue...

In a proposal that could reshape the economics and competitive landscape of the mortgage industry, the Federal Housing Finance Agency this week proposed two alternatives for servicing compensation on future Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac business that could end up being the model for the market beyond the government-sponsored enterprises.“As the recent problems in managing mortgage delinquencies suggest, the current servicing compensation model was not designed for current market conditions,” said FHFA Acting Director Edward DeMarco. “The goal of this joint initiative is to explore alternative models for single-family mortgage servicing compensation that...

The supply of mortgage debt outstanding continued to decline in the second quarter of 2011, reaching levels not seen in nearly five years. The Federal Reserve reported that single-family mortgage debt totaled $10.396 trillion as of the end of June, down 0.5 percent from the end of the previous quarter. It marked the 13th consecutive quarterly decline in the mortgage servicing business, which has shrunk by $783.2 billion since peaking in the first quarter of 2008 at $11.179 trillion. The only sector of the market that’s growing is the Ginnie Mae program, where the supply of the agency’s single-family mortgage securities...(Includes one data chart)

Home-purchase mortgage lending continues to sputter along in 2011 and lender hopes of any increased mortgage production in the months ahead remain focused on declining mortgage rates and the refinance sector – and not the listless housing market. According to numbers compiled by Inside Mortgage Finance, home-purchase mortgage originations totaled an anemic $209 billion in the first half of this year – the lowest level seen in more than a decade. While weak home sales in 2011 are the major reason for the low home-purchase mortgage activity, another big factor is the prevalence of cash purchases in the current housing market. Results from...(Includes one data chart)

A proposal from federal regulators to change servicer compensation on future Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac MBS to a fee-for-service model could also end up addressing a major investor beef about the non-agency MBS market: poor servicing of distressed loans and misaligned interests. The Federal Housing Finance Agency this week released a discussion paper outlining a radical change from an existing system that pays Fannie and Freddie servicers a minimum servicing fee regardless of the loan status. The proposed system features a low flat fee for handling performing loans with increased compensation for...

The 14 mortgage servicing firms hit by the enforcement actions brought by the Federal Reserve and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency can expect to see soon a new process by which individual borrowers facing foreclosure can request an independent review, outgoing Acting Comptroller of the Currency John Walsh told industry representatives last week. “As we explored the best means of ensuring that injured homeowners had the opportunity to seek relief, it became clear that what was needed was a robust, transparent and accessible complaint process that will give borrowers the opportunity to request an independent foreclosure review,” Walsh said at a mortgage regulatory forum sponsored by SourceMedia. “I’m happy to say in the next several weeks you’ll see the roll out of just such a process.”

Among the sensitivities associated with the mortgage industry’s foreclosure struggles, none is more fraught with headline risk and the potential for political pressure than foreclosing on an active-duty servicemember of the U.S. military, a top industry attorney told compliance officials this week. “It’s bad enough when you get it wrong on a regular foreclosure action, but when you get it wrong for one of our servicemembers, that’s really where you’re going to have a reputation killer,” Leah Getlan, assistant general counsel at Capital One, told attendees this week at the Mortgage Bankers Association’s annual regulatory compliance conference in the nation’s capital. “I have seen it from time to time, but thankfully, not that often.”

New Jersey. In northern New Jersey, 8 percent of mortgages are in foreclosure – twice the share for the United States as a whole, according to a new regional mortgage brief prepared by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. An additional 4 percent of northern New Jersey mortgages are at least 90 days delinquent, the point at which a foreclosure filing can be initiated. “Combined, 12 percent – or about one in eight mortgages – are seriously delinquent,” the Fed said. “By comparison, the pre-crisis share of mortgages seriously delinquent in this region was less than 2 percent.” But flows of mortgages into foreclosure and delinquency are down from their peak levels, although still considerably up from pre-crisis levels. However, the pool of mortgages already in foreclosure continues to grow because there are more loans entering the foreclosure process than there are loans completing the process each month. Foreclosures are lengthy, often taking many months or even years.