Loan Think

Readers of the National Mortgage News website and our weekly have probably noticed our stories about the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. going after loan brokers on buyback claims. When looking at the issue as an objective third party we try not to take sides. But when it comes to column/blog writing, those rules are thrown out the window.

The mortgage job picture was not awful in June despite slow application growth. In total, the industry shed 2,400 full-time employees – 1,800 of which were loan brokers. (For the full story visit: www.nationalmortgagenews.com. Also, the mortgage numbers lag the national totals by one month.)

If you're an investor where do you park your money these days? Treasury bonds? Cash? Equities? Gold? Oil? Ladies and gentlemen, pick your poison because there are no clear bets unless you are solely trying to preserve principal.

If you need to refinance or buy a home, Quicken Home Loans is offering a 30-year FRM at 4.4% at 0.25 points. It sounds like a good deal to me and I'm sure other lenders will match that rate. Why are rates so low?

Ask any mortgage banker about compliance and chances are he or she can quickly rattle off how much this task is costing his firm each year.

I was riding the New York City Subway to work one recent morning, when a father and his approximately five-year-old son sat across from me.

Recently as I chaired the SourceMedia Buying and Selling Distressed Mortgage Portfolios Forum in New York City, I was thinking about this huge market and how it hasn't quite opened up wide yet. But surely it is in the process of doing so.

Phil Sotelo, the owner of Realty Executives Sotelo & Associates was arrested for mortgage fraud for recording phony documents at a county office and refused to leave his north Modesto home after it was sold at public auction, according to an arrest warrant affidavit.

In the wake of a purported debt deal, rates are falling, which is usually good news for both consumers and mortgage bankers. But how much new business will result from a 2.74% yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury? (Does a debt downgrade even matter?)

We have a debt deal, but let's not kid ourselves: the mortgage and housing finance industries have been forever changed the past three years and one likely victim will be the mortgage interest deduction. President Obama, a Democrat, has no qualms about killing or whittling down the MID. (He's not too keen on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac either.)