Kate Berry has covered the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau for American Banker since 2016. She joined the publication in 2006 covering mortgage lending and the financial crisis. Berry also has covered big banks including Bank of America, J.P. Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo. She has won five awards from the Society of American Business Writers and Editors, and has worked at several news organizations including the Orange County Register, the Los Angeles Business Journal and the Associated Press. Berry began her career as a clerk at the New York Times.
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Fannie Mae is offering yet another carrot to lenders that have lobbied extensively for relief from loan repurchases.
December 15 -
U.S. Bancorp has plucked longtime lending executive Tom Wind from EverBank Financial to run its mortgage business.
December 10 -
Eileen Serra, 61, the chief executive of the Chase Card Services unit, will step down in January and become an adviser to the company on growth initiatives, according to a memo Wednesday from Gordon Smith, JPMorgan's CEO of consumer and community banking.
December 9 -
Calvin Hagins, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's deputy assistant director for originations, warned mortgage lenders this week about four contentious areas that its examiners will zero in on next year.
December 9 -
Two independent mortgage banks agreed to settlements in the past week with the Justice Department for failing to meet Federal Housing Administration guidelines. The cases are a warning to nonbank lenders that they need to beef up self-reporting of deficiencies, and they remind large banks about the legal risks associated with FHA lending.
December 7 -
There are no easy fixes to Nationstar's myriad problems including a plunging stock price and increased regulatory scrutiny but Chief Executive Jay Bray says the turnaround starts with a commitment to improving customer service.
December 7 -
Kal Raman has resigned as president and chief executive of Xome, the digital platform of the nonbank mortgage servicer Nationstar Mortgage Holdings.
December 1 -
Anticipation of rising interest rates has stirred more talk among mortgage lenders about the need to originate loans to borrowers with low credit scores.
November 30 -
The Federal Housing Finance Agency said Wednesday that conforming loan limits for mortgages purchased by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will remain at existing levels except in 39 high-cost counties.
November 25 -
Bryan Sullivan, the CFO at LoanDepot, talks about its growth prospects without fuel from an initial public offering, how getting consumers to opt for home equity lines of credit is tough, and why he considers the nonbank a disruptor.
November 24 -
Prospect Mortgage, a Sherman Oaks, Calif., nonbank lender, has agreed to pay $10.1 million in borrower restitution and penalties for violating federal and state laws, California's Department of Business Oversight said Thursday.
November 19 -
Luther Burbank Savings, in Santa Rosa, Calif., has established three home loan programs aimed at helping low- and moderate-income borrowers afford to buy homes in nine California counties.
November 4 -
Freddie Mac Chief Executive Donald Layton insisted Tuesday that the government-sponsored enterprise showed "very strong fundamentals" in the third quarter, despite reporting a $501 million loss due to an accounting mismatch with its use of derivatives.
November 3 -
Freddie Mac posted a third quarter loss of $501 million, its first quarterly loss in four years, but the government-sponsored enterprise will not request a draw from the U.S. Treasury.
November 3 -
The government-sponsored enterprise is working to rebuild partnerships with church organizations and housing financing agencies as part of a broader effort to make owning a home affordable for low- and moderate-income families.
November 2 -
Bank of America has agreed to pay $335 million to settle a lawsuit claiming it misled shareholders about risky mortgages and its dependence on the electronic mortgage registry known as MERS.
November 2 -
The CFPBs expanded data requirements for the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act will create a powerful tool for analyzing fair lending compliance. But some say the initiative is a massive overreach that could compromise borrower privacy.
October 23 -
Mortgage servicer Ocwen Financial failed four servicing tests in the second half of 2014. Joseph A. Smith Jr., the monitor of the $25 billion national mortgage settlement, said the Atlanta servicer was beginning to show progress in complying with terms of the 2012 agreement.
October 22 -
Housing finance reform in Congress is stalled, but Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (often under pressure from their regulator) are forming partnerships, developing new products and finding ways to share risk with the private sector to correct flaws in the housing system.
October 20 -
Mortgage servicers have gotten a rare reprieve from the Federal Housing Administration.
October 20
