Servicing

Congress has extended the Protecting Tenants at Foreclosure Act through 2014 as part of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform bill that President Obama signed this week.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency is seeing significant improvement in the quality of new business at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as a result of tighter underwriting standards promulgated by the two.

Lender Processing Services Inc., Jacksonville, Fla., earned $80 million in the second quarter, a 7% increase from the same period last year.

As Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac increasingly send problem loans back to their seller/servicers for repurchase, banks may not know their full liability in this area, according to a new research report.

Sales of existing homes in Florida rose for the 22nd consecutive month in June, a sign that this beleaguered housing market may be stabilizing.

Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke said that U.S. housing policy, with its reliance on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, is "not sustainable."

A group of private label investors acting through the Dallas law firm of Talcott Franklin PC, said its members now represent ownership interests in about one-third of the $1.5 trillion PLS market.

The Federal Home Loan Bank of Boston earned $18.7 million in the second quarter, a major improvement compared to the same period last year when it lost $22.9 million.

Kondaur Capital Corp., an active investor in distressed and underperforming mortgages, is marketing a $79 million mortgage-backed security that is collateralized by $263 million of NPL loans.

Lewis Ranieri, the co-inventor of the mortgage backed security, believes the yield on the 10-year Treasury could fall to as low as 2.5% this year.