Kate Berry

Ginnie Mae has halted the transfer of mortgage servicing rights from Bank of America to a nonbank servicer because of missing documents. The agency is asking the top servicers for an inventory of loans with missing documents.

After a year in which bankers have voiced steady opposition to the qualified mortgage rule, more than a third now say they will make non-QM loans in targeted markets, a major reversal from the industry's past stance.

After slogging through several quarters of high expenses and shrinking profits, some lenders are now selling mortgage servicing rights to raise cash to cover payroll and expenses, industry sources say.

Rising home prices have emboldened some lenders to search for remaining underwater borrowers who have not refinanced. Wishful thinking? Maybe, but with home purchases scare, lenders have few other options.

With more reliable loan data, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would have greater confidence that borrowers would not default. In return, lenders would receive a juicy carrot: fewer buyback requests.

The settlement monitor gave the banks credit for $20 billion in relief – less than half the total provided, since only partial credit was given for breaks other than principal reduction.

In the current tough mortgage environment, some lenders are willing to take the risk of lending to foreign nationals. The loans don't conform to regulations that took effect in January and typically are held on banks' balance sheets.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau plans to address the growing problem of vacant and abandoned properties that banks and mortgage servicers have walked away from to avoid maintaining the homes.

The increased scrutiny, mortgage bankers complain, would end recent attempts to provide home loans to borrowers with weaker credit, something the FHA has been trying to spur for years.

After halting an Ocwen deal to purchase mortgage-servicing rights from Wells Fargo, New York's Department of Financial Services is turning its attention to another nonbank servicer, Nationstar.

Two of the three major nonbank servicers are sticking by plans to acquire portfolios from banks this year, in spite of regulatory scrutiny and concern they are growing too fast.

The second-largest home lender's warning that it will lose money in the business this year is a forceful reminder that the housing market has not fully recovered from the downturn.

Bitter weather, the qualified mortgage rule's restrictive guidelines and the lingering effects of the foreclosure crisis have put a crimp in homebuying at an inopportune time for lenders.

The largest U.S. bank's apartment loan business is mushrooming, aided by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac retrenching. Now JPMorgan is refocusing on a market where, surprisingly, it lags: New York.

Prospect Mortgage entered a $3.1 million settlement with California regulators for overcharging mortgage borrowers per diem interest over a seven-year period.

New York's banking regulator unleashed a verbal assault on nonbank servicer Ocwen Financial Wednesday, saying the company's claims about tech-driven efficiencies are "too good to be true."

Regulatory intervention throws a monkey wrench into a mortgage servicer's growth plans—and calls into question whether there are enough nonbanks to absorb all the servicing banks want to sell.

The New York regulator questioned Ocwen’s ability to handle more volume after an independent monitor reviewed the mortgage servicer’s operations, a person familiar with the situation says.

Lynn E. Szymoniak, famous for helping to uncover the robo-signing scandal, is now suing 22 companies for allegedly creating fraudulent documents and submitting tens of thousands of false claims to HUD.

A little-noticed charge taken by Regions Financial in the fourth quarter may portend that other banks have not been adequately reserving for modified home loans, known as troubled debt restructurings.