Servicing

Michael Barr, assistant Treasury secretary for financial institutions, and Edward DeMarco, acting director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, will testify before the House Financial Services Subcommittee Wednesday regarding the future of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

What a difference two years make. Fannie Mae cleared 123 new Florida condominiums for financing in the first eight months of 2010, according to Condo Vultures.

The California Department of Financial Institutions is urging financial institutions to review their lending policies in order to grant "appropriate latitude" to existing customers, including mortgagors, affected by the San Bruno gas leak explosion that occurred late last week.

Bank loans have been shrinking since the first quarter of 2009, and holdings of debt securities have filled some of the hole.

Capstead Mortgage, Dallas, a publicly traded REIT that invests in agency MBS, cut its third quarter dividend by 28%, down $0.26 per share.

Foreclosures mandated by the government-controlled Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac jumped by 12% in the second quarter to 275,000 units, according to new figures released Friday.

Ocwen Financial Corp. said it paid $1.196 billion, or 7.4% less than originally planned, when it closed on its purchase of HomEq Servicing Corp., North Highlands, Calif., citing runoff in the company's securities and whole loan portfolio.

Recent defaults on five commercial mortgages with balances of more than $100 million caused the CMBS delinquency rate to increase 23-basis points in August to 8.48%, according to a new report from Fitch Ratings.

The head of the Philadelphia Housing Authority — the nation's fourth-largest such agency — took home more than a quarter of a million dollars last year but still had trouble paying his mortgage.

While speculation about the possibility of a "double-dip" recession continues, bond yields have risen slightly over the past week, pushing up 30-year mortgage rates by a few basis points.