Loan Think

Even though there are signs of life in the auction market for nonperforming residential loans, we continue to hear reports that several banks and investment bankers won't sell their dirty linen in the public market for fear of taking a big hit. There are exceptions, of course, and we're working on a story about that.

What a difference a few weeks make. The yield on the 10-year Treasury was close to 3.3% today and although mortgages are not pegged to the bond, everyone knows that if the 10-year rises in yield, usually mortgage rates follow in tandem.

We promise not to lecture in this article but the headline above says it all. If you are reading this, then we commend you for having stuck it out during the past few years. Things have not been easy for sure. So take a minute and congratulate yourself. Reverse mortgages still hold a lot of promise for the future. But you know where we’re going with this.

Monday evening the U.S. Treasury sold $10.5 billion worth of Citigroup common stock, washing its hands (sort of) of the once dominant megabank. Treasury said U.S. taxpayers will earn a profit of roughly $12 billion on their initial $45 billion investment in the company.

If there has been one lesson to heed from the current crisis is that to remain a successful mortgage professional, you need to build a referral-based business. But for quite a few people, they need to know the answer to the basic question how do they start.

Over the past year or so we've been reporting on the increasing likelihood that some factions of the mortgage business might shift over from being controlled by banks to nondepositories. Case in point, is the recent National Mortgage News story on the rise of IBM in the servicing space.

Allied Home Mortgage Capital Corp has agreed to pay $38,000 fine for violations of branch office rules that require the corporation to pay all expenses of all branch offices. (See Mortgagee Approval Handbook 4050.1 Rev-2 ¶¶ 2-8, 2-14.B.). AHMCC also agreed to refund “improper fees” to two borrowers and “buy down the principal of one loan that was over-insured,” HUD said.

THIS JUST IN: Bank of America has taken it on the chin the past two years (along with its stock price). Its "legacy" problems can be directly traced to its August 2008 purchase of Countrywide Financial Corp., which had $80 billion in problematic loans (home equity, nonprime, alt-A) on its books.

Jumbo mortgage lenders take note: The (Don) Corleone estate is for sale in Staten Island. The asking price for the 8-bedroom, 4.5-bath house in NYC's most suburban borough is $2.9 million. Staten Island is just a ferry ride away from lower Manhattan where a different type of mob makes its living: the stock market gang.

Are you out of time? Out of energy? Have you said lately, "I’m just not going to respond to that e-mail or phone call. Don’t they know how busy I am?" Yet, the time you are spending on your business is not exactly yielding the results that you really desire, need and/or want?