The nation’s largest residential originators are making hay while the sun shines—with the notable exception of Bank of America.
According to bank earnings reports of the past few weeks, residential fundings are on a tear with the anticipation that application volumes will continue to hold steady or increase.
Wells Fargo, the nation’s largest funder, saws originations soar by 102% in 2Q compared to the same period a year ago.
B of A, by contrast, saw fundings decline by 53% as it continues to whittle down its presence in residential finance. (B of A is also actively peddling chunks of its mortgage servicing portfolio on a monthly basis.)
In total, Wells originated $131 billion of mortgages, carving out a 2Q market share north of 35%, according to preliminary estimates made by National Mortgage News and the Quarterly Data Report.
In 1Q Wells had an origination share of almost 31%, a record for both the company and the industry.
Even though the bank is exiting the wholesale space (see related story in this week’s edition of NMN) its production volumes likely won’t suffer much when 3Q is said and done.
In the most recently tally, just 5% of Well’s originators came through brokers. Meanwhile, competitors say the bank has been transitioning its underwriters to support retail efforts even more. Retail is a channel where the bank is already dominant with a market share of 25%. Its next closest competitor in retail is Chase at just 10.6%.
In overall residential lending, Wells is far ahead of Chase with three-times the quarterly volume. In short, no other mortgage funder comes close to Wells. (For the full story see the Monday paper edition of NMN.)
