Compliance & Regulation

The message at the 2012 Regional Conference of Mortgage Bankers Associations in Atlantic City from many of the speakers at the first residential lending general session and at a roundtable hosted by National Mortgage News/Origination News was there is a lot of uncertainty regarding the future direction of the industry. And that is because it is waiting on a definition of what will constitute a qualified mortgage. Yet, attendees at the show were upbeat that the worse times are behind them.

The risk that securitized commercial mortgages from the years of loose underwriting will have trouble refinancing at maturity is largely said to have not materialized, but a report last week indicates it is still an outstanding risk both domestically and internationally.

House Democrats said Tuesday that a Fannie Mae program to reduce mortgage principal was killed two years ago by ideologically blinded officials who ignored projections that the plan would save taxpayers money.

Fannie Mae and Citibank officials were developing a principal reduction pilot program that was supposed to go live in July 2010 when it was “mysteriously” stopped and later terminated.

n this season of high political drama it is not really surprising that potential candidates, as well as a myriad of federal agencies, are all jockeying for the most complimentary spot in the limelight. The National Fair Housing Alliance is no exception.

Loss severities on U.S. commercial mortgage-backed securities have reached 45%, according to Fitch, which said this is a point at which they could plateau.

Lenders are no more willing now to make a home loan backed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac than they were six years ago, according to a Federal Reserve Board survey released Monday.

Compliance within the financial services industry impacts the entire organization and is key to the bottom line for firms currently operating in the mortgage space. Comprehensive compliance risk management strategies are required to meet compliance obligations and also protect customers, employees and shareholders.

About 9,000 title industry insiders participated in the Ernst survey and 40% of respondents felt that fraud in real estate transactions had increased within the last year.

Industry efforts to pass legislation that would exclude originator compensation from the statutory points and fees test in the qualified mortgage rule are off to a slow start on Capitol Hill.