Moody's Concerned About Ocwen's Servicing Growth Rate

Given the rapid growth of its servicing portfolio, Moody's Investors Service analysts are reviewing for downgrade the quality of Ocwen Loan Servicing's primary servicing and special servicing of subprime residential mortgage loans.

The ongoing growth in Ocwen's portfolio "has not led to a decline in its collection or loan administration abilities," analysts wrote.

In addition, so far its loss mitigation efforts consistently result in a high level of modifications, and re-modifications, hence Ocwen's servicer quality metrics "have remained stable."

The challenge for Ocwen is to maintain servicing quality despite the fast scaling of its operations, says Moody's Assistant Vice President and Analyst Gene Berman.

In 2013 Ocwen added almost 2.8 million loans to its servicing portfolio, he adds.

Among others, Ocwen services the OneWest Bank, FSB portfolio, which is one example of how servicing capabilities can be overstretched.

The OneWest Bank portfolio has increased to over $518 billion, up from only $55 billion in assets that Ocwen serviced as of mid-2010.

"Integrating OneWest's servicing platforms and managing the additional loan portfolios could also stress Ocwen's resources and ability to service loans," Berman warns.