Servicing

Independent mortgage lenders are concerned that regulators will use the report as an excuse to raise minimum net worth requirements for smaller lenders.

Lower rates of return would require insurers to charge higher premiums or stop covering loans to borrowers with lower credit scores. (You know, the ones the government wants to help?)

Advocates blame the securitization-financed, institutional-scale landlords for astronomical rents and poor maintenance and call for Congressional hearings and government oversight.

Altisource Portfolio Solutions' acquisition of Mortgage Builder Software will close next month, the companies announced Monday, following weeks of rumors but no official confirmation of the deal.

In another reshuffling of its mortgage ranks, Bank of America has promoted D. Steve Boland, who joined the company through the 2008 acquisition of Countrywide Financial, to head residential lending.

ReadyCap Lending has acquired CIT Small Business Lending from its parent CIT Group, including $1.3 billion in servicing rights on loans guaranteed by the U.S. Small Business Administration.

Republic Bancorp reported a slight bump in second-profits due to modest loan growth but results were tempered somewhat by a sharp drop in mortgage banking income.

Second-quarter earnings nearly doubled at Home Loan Servicing Solutions, despite a significant jump in operating expenses, as prepayments remained low and the rate of liquidations of seriously delinquent loans recovered.

Wells Fargo & Co. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. , the behemoths of the U.S. mortgage market, are surrendering more business to nonbank lenders.

These investors complain they get little say or direct recompense in government settlements with big banks over misrepresentations of mortgage securities like the Department of Justice's $7 billion deal with Citigroup.