Finance

The volume of refinance applications increased for the first time in six weeks, while purchase applications were at their highest point in nearly four months, leading to a 4.8% seasonally adjusted increase in overall application volume, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

Democrats on the Senate Banking Committee are urging the Federal Housing Finance Agency to take more aggressive steps to allow refinancing by homeowners with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac mortgages.

Investors are increasingly demanding servicers/special servicers file hazard insurance claims on REO properties regardless of whether they will be approved.

Here's a pop quiz for all jumbo MBS fans: what's the biggest stumbling block to the private label securities market taking off? Answer: the subordination levels on jumbo deals are about twice what they used to be, which means the credit pendulum has swung overly far to the conservative side.

Bank of America this month will try to unload roughly $42 billion of mortgage servicing rights through two different offerings, one involving private label product, according to investors and investment bankers familiar with the bank's auction plans.

Hudson Valley Holding Corp. has completed the sale of $474 million in loans after it was required to reduce its concentrations in commercial real estate and classified loans.

DBRS has rated a rare prime residential private-label RMBS backed by recently originated portfolio of loans and Fitch Ratings has issued an unsolicited rating on the deal.

Only a single borrower is currently delinquent among the roughly 1,800 newly originated prime loans securitized in the handful of Sequoia/Redwood private-label residential mortgage-backed security deals seen since the start of 2010, according to a Fitch report Monday.

Fannie Mae purchased $62 billion of mortgages from its seller/servicers in February, its weakest monthly acquisition volume in four months.

Mortgage loan options available have significantly shrunk during the past few years of the crisis to the point that makes some worry creativity is almost impossible, or simply dead. A closer look at borrower preferences and market data indicate product variations may not necessarily be a dare banks need to stay away from.

If you're looking for the next megabank to exit the mortgage sector the most likely candidate would be Ally Financial, the government owned bank holding company that controls No. 5 ranked servicer GMAC Mortgage/Residential Capital Corp.

A Fitch Ratings pre-sale report is out on the first commercial mortgage-backed security backed by non- and sub-performing assets to come to market in over a decade.

A federal judge rejected an attempt by the Securities and Exchange Commission to compel Wells Fargo & Co. to comply with an administrative subpoena, ordering the agency and the bank to meet to resolve their dispute over documents related to the agency's investigation of nearly $60 billion of residential mortgage-backed securities.

A pilot program can be devised to show principal reduction is a cost-effective way to keep underwater Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac borrowers in their homes and prevent strategic defaults, according to a new report by a research group.

For the past three months, the nation's largest residential servicers have had a lock on refinancing high LTV and underwater loans in their GSE portfolios. In a nutshell the megabanks could manually underwrite loans they controlled under Dec. 1 revisions made to the Home Affordable Refinancing Program.

Banc of Manhattan Capital, Woodland Hills, Calif., is taking bids on a $26 million pool of re-performing whole loans, servicing released.

The aggregate value of loans collateralized by commercial MBS increased 50 basis points in February from the month prior, continuing an upward trend, said DebtX, a Boston-based loan sales advisor.

Although Wells Fargo & Co. won't talk about its 'exclusionary' list of third-party lenders, correspondent loan buyers doing business with some of the firms say they wound up on the list mostly because of buyback disputes with the megabank.

Builder Meritage Homes Corp. has priced $300 million in senior unsecured notes due 2022 to qualified institutional buyers under Rule 144A.

The headline of today's daily 'What We're Hearing' blast sounds like junk mail that you might see in your email inbox. But rest assured, certain mortgage REITs are paying hefty dividends these days. At the top of the list is Annaly Capital Management, which has a 13.5% dividend/yield rate.