Finance

Lower interest rates enabled Ashford Hospitality Trust Inc. to close a $112.6 million loan secured by the Renaissance Hotel in Nashville, Tenn., and the Westin Hotel in Princeton, N.J.

Moody’s Investors Service has assigned a range of definitive ratings to about $300 million in commercial mortgage-backed securities from a single-asset transaction.

Steadfast said it has invested over $467 million in 25 apartment communities in nine Midwestern and Southern states.

Las Vegas area home prices overall are up year-to-year again, but the chips are still down when it comes to the number of total sales.

Deutsche Bank AG was sued in New York by Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemberg, which accuses the German bank of fraud in the sale of $173 million in mortgage-backed securities in 2007.

Moody’s Investors Service has downgraded the ratings of 11 tranches and upgraded the ratings of six tranches from six 2004 jumbo residential mortgage-backed securities deals issued by Wells Fargo.

MBIA Inc. is paying executives $11.4 million in cash bonuses to stay with the company for at least three more years.

Standard & Poor's downgraded to BB from BB-plus its underlying rating on nearly $700 million of Queens Ballpark LLC bonds used to backstop the construction of the New York Mets' Citi Field.

Sales of U.S.-backed mortgage bonds soared to a three-year high as steps by the Federal Reserve and Obama administration to make home ownership more affordable propelled a 34% jump in refinancing.

The upcoming deadline for the qualified mortgage definition is causing a lot of excitement in the secondary market.

Some cities, like Santa Ana, are refusing to hand over to the state money from the remaining affordable housing funds of their defunct redevelopment agencies.

The housing market will continue to improve in 2013, as long as the U.S. economy continues its slow recovery, according to Standard & Poor's.

Rep. Barney Frank, the retiring lead Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, has always been known for speaking his mind.

Guthrie Federal Credit Union has joined the Federal Home Loan Bank of Pittsburgh.

Builder Lennar Corp.’s Rialto Capital subsidiary has completed the first closing of its second real estate investment fund.

Fortress Investment Group said principal and director Robert Kauffman is retiring from the company.

Wall Street banks are offering warehouse lines to fund investors that are gathering large portfolios of single-family rental properties to begin the process of a securitization.

Hurricane Sandy’s impact on the private-label residential mortgage-backed securities market won’t be systematic and estimates for it are shrinking under closer examination.

Lower yields on mortgage-backed securities haven’t led to more savings on home loans after the Fed expanded its balance sheet to an all-time high of almost $3 trillion through bond purchases.

Donna DeMaio will have the same policies that led United Guaranty to become No. 1 in new insurance written.