Loan Think

A management consulting firm declared that it is not the economy that is totally responsible for the problems at a small business, it is that business's own waste.

MORTGAGE FRAUD HIGHER IN 2008 AND EXPECTED TO GO HIGHER

News website later today: http://www.nationalmortgagenews.com/. Meanwhile, stocks soared on Thursday after positive earnings by Ford Motor company and a host of other firms. Of course, Thursday evening was a different matter when software giant Microsoft reported a 29% drop in sales of its Windows software. Revenue was $13.1 billion, a 17% drop from the year-ago quarter. What does all this have to do with mortgages? Unless companies such as Ford and Microsoft (the latter of which still earned a nice profit) start hiring full-time workers, residential loan delinquencies will keep going up. It's as simple as that. Keep in mind that Ford only had a good quarter because it restructured its debt. It's not like auto sales are booming. Companies cannot keep cutting costs and workers forever. Terrific stock market gains are nice but won't last forever which brings me to the case of banks. Commercial banks with securities affiliates are posting strong gains because of - you got it - recent stock market gains. Unless these stock gains continue, earnings won't be so pretty...

Over the next few weeks, this article will be dedicated to educating all that are ready for a substantial change in their life. For disclosure, nothing written below is easy.

THIS JUST IN: An industry veteran with a long track record in mortgage banking is entering the warehouse lending arena with his new bank. The full story will be in the Monday edition of National Mortgage News. Don't subscribe? Call: 800-221-1809...

Did the Federal Reserve this morning put another nail in the coffin of mortgage brokers as well as loan officers who live off of yield spread premiums? The Fed has issued – in an attempt to kill YSPs -- a proposed rule that would only allow mortgage origination companies to compensate LOs and third-party professionals based on the principal amount of the loan. National Mortgage News’ Brian Collins was at the Fed this morning and the full story will be on our website shortly (http://www.nationalmortgagenews.com/) with more analysis to come in our weekly. Meanwhile, as I write this the stock market is up 100-plus points and has cracked 9,000. Does this mean the worm has turned and that the U.S. economy is back? Does this mean all those empty houses in Vegas – and all those empty condos in Miami – will start flying off the shelves? Or is all this a “false positive”? And what will happen when the federal first time home buyer tax credit expires and rates start moving up? Stay tuned...

For the last two days I have been meeting with my Platinum Group here in Baltimore. These are two full days of profit producing ideas and discoveries. Much like Napoleon Hill spells out in his book, "Think and Grow Rich." Everyone shares ideas that are working. Everyone helps each other with their challenges.

File this under ‘Mortgage Lazarus’: Even though it confirmed to National Mortgage News last week that it was in the process of closing its doors, software provider MortgageDashboard has posted a notice on the sign-in page of its website, saying it has found private equity backers and is up and running again. Later today NMN will publish the full story (by our technology editor Tony Garritano) on its website. Meanwhile, in Senate testimony today Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke said the return of the private label (read jumbo) securitization market will be a slow process. As most readers know, the private label market has been dead for so long that I can’t even remember the funeral. Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) complained a bit that consumers in his state who have the wherewithal to buy high priced homes don’t have a whole lot of financing options. Mr. Martinez was a HUD secretary during the George W. Bush administration...

Have you found that the reverse mortgage business in your area has become more competitive? Or is it maybe that the senior borrower is more hesitant about making a decision? Whatever your perception of your local market, I am hearing these concerns raised more and more in our coaching calls. What can you do to change this perception and get yourself back on track?

MERS has held the first trimester meeting of the Mortgage Industry Standards Maintenance Organization since taking over as the managing entity of the standards body. Us journalists are not allowed in these top-secret meetings, even though we’d like to participate, hint, hint. So, we have to rely on the comments from those that are allowed in. And in my conversations with attendees, they all agreed that this first meeting was a success.