Look for the Lehman Brothers-owned Aurora Loan Services of Colorado to ramp up wholesale subprimeproduction in 2003 and to add quite a few people...
With the holidays just around the corner and the year about to end, here's something to think about: In 1990all mortgage lenders (mortgage bankers, banks, thrifts, etc.) funded $458 billion in home loans. In 2002, 12 yearslater, it looks as though (according to figures compiled by National Mortgage News) that all mortgagelenders will wind up funding about $2.45 trillion. To boot, the top two lenders in the U.S. -- Wells Fargoand Washington Mutual -- will have combined production (using three channels) of about $450 billion! Bythe end of this past week, the yield on the 10 year-Treasury had fallen below the magic 4.0% mark...
Remember Thomas H. Lee Partners, which made a killing on both Snapple and HomeSide Lending?Well, apparently, Tommy Lee's second dip into the mortgage pool has been -- to say the least -- not so successful.In 1999, Lee's group pumped $500 million into Conseco, which filed for bankruptcy protection last week.That investment is more or less worthless. Conseco operates both a home equity unit as well as a manufactured housinglender. Conseco was mostly an insurer, that is until 1998, when it bought Green Tree Financial, St. Paul,for a whopping $7 billion. The purchase of Green Tree brought into Conseco the subprime/manuf. division...
We're continuing to hear that if HSBC does in fact wind up purchasing subprime giant Householdthat there will be pressure put on Household to leave FM Watch...
FM Watch confidant Haley Barbour, a past chairman of the Republican National Committee, is runningfor governor of Mississippi...
At last count the Department of Housing and Urban Development had received 46,000 comment letters onRESPA reform. (Some are apparently duplicates.) The agency has apparently had to hire extra workers just to openall the letters...
MORTGAGE PEOPLE: Fidelity National Financial has promoted Raymond R. (Randy) Quirk to president.GMAC Mortgage has named Dan Scheuble its chief information officer (CIO). Donald P. Lofe Jr.has been named executive vice president and chief financial officer of The PMI Group.
A CLARIFICATION: In last week's weekend roundup we told you that there would be an update this past weekon MortgageWire concerning the Fannie Mae-Focus Group story. There was no update, but there shouldbe one soon in National Mortgage News.
A HOLIDAY STORY: Over a drink with an official familiar with the reverse mortgage industry we heard thatone senior is using his reverse mortgage money to buy a mail order bride from the Philippines. No word yet on whetherthe bride will arrive in time for the holidays. Have a Merry Holiday Season! MortgageWire (the National MortgageNews website) will publish every day next week, except for Christmas day, Wednesday.
