HUD secretary Mel Martinez went on CNBC Wednesday afternoon to discuss the agency's pending changesto RESPA. No, he didn't say when his long awaited RESPA proposal would be out. (It's a bit like that play, "Waitingfor Godot," no?) Mr. Martinez gave few details -- except he's adamant about letting the consumer knowhow much in loan fees brokers are making on each deal. This should go over big with the 35,000 or so loan brokersthat operate in Florida, a state he plans to run for the Senate in. Whatever HUD finally spews out you can expectlegal challenges by certain industry factions that feel they will be harmed by the rule...
A source told us that PNC Financial Services (a commercial bank) really, really, misses its mortgagecompany and is sorry that it ever sold the unit to Washington Mutual three years ago. Meanwhile, WaMu haseliminated the unpopular fee it charges non-customers for using its ATMs. It's a competitive move as the mega thriftmoves to takeover the New York market...
Here's an interesting question: What if Freddie Mac's stock price comes back? The company is being suedby shareholders who are mad their holdings got hammered earlier this year (its 52-week low is $46, its high $64)when the board ousted its three top officers and the company's restatement scandal spiraled out of control. Theshare price of the company is now around $54. And what if it does, in fact, restate past earnings upwards of $4.5billion and its stock jumps even more? Suddenly those paper losses (assuming the suing shareholders did not panicand sell) could be transformed into profits. To boot, early this past week Merrill Lynch upgraded both FannieMae and Freddie to "buy" from "neutral." Another thought: Roughly 19 equities analystsfollow Freddie's stock. Four rate it a "strong buy," six a "buy" and nine a "hold."Twenty-two analysts cover Fannie. Eight analysts rate it a "strong" buy, eight a "buy" andsix a "hold"...
Thornburg Mortgage Home Loans Santa Fe, N.M., will begin originating single-family residential mortgagesin New York State and the District of Columbia. This fast growing lender also has received approval to lend inNew Hampshire, Hawaii and Washington state. "The New York City area in particular is compelling," saidJoseph Bedal, TMHL's chief executive officer. "With the median existing-home price in New York Cityof $350,900, it's essentially a market comprised of jumbo loans, which is our primary lending focus"...
GE Real Estate, the commercial mortgage arm of the conglomerate, is looking for experienced CRE underwritersin Irvine, Calif., New York, Washington, D.C., and Dallas...
In early August, Salomon Levis, chief executive of mortgage lender Doral Financial, said thatcontrary to popular thought about rising mortgage rates, his Puerto Rico-based company would do just fine. He doesnot believe rising rates will have an adverse effect on the profitability of Doral's loan production in the PuertoRico market and that it represents an opportunity for Doral to realize additional profits by widening its tax-exemptinterest spread and by increasing the value of its servicing portfolio. In 1999, when mortgage interest rates weremuch higher, Doral's refinancings were at 61% of total loan production vs. 55% in the first half of 2003. Doralis publicly traded...
Centex Corp., the nation's No. 4 ranked homebuilder, plans to sell about $800 million of asset-backedsecurities supported by home equity loans. Centex, of course, is also in the mortgage business...
This past week Matrix Bancorp closed on the sale of its Phoenix-based mortgage origination. The buyer?AmPro Mortgage Corp., which we understand is Bill Starkey Sr.'s new company. Bill "retired"after he sold AccuBanc Mortgage a few years back. Apparently, he got tired of playing golf...
The Federal Trade Commission released a report saying 10 million Americans were victimized by identitytheft last year. The report outlines the dramatic increase in the rate of identity theft and the cost of identitytheft crimes to consumers and businesses. According to the study, identity theft cost consumers nearly $53 billion,not counting the 300 million hours spent trying to repair damaged credit records...
WASHINGTON NEWS: Washington Mutual and World Savings, the two largest users of FHLB advances,want the Treasury to regulate the FHLB System because they have concerns about the competency of the Federal HousingFinance Board. (National Mortgage News broke the story on its website on Friday.) Meanwhile, FHFBchairman John Korsmo wants the FHLBs to register their stock with the Securities and Exchange Commission,a notion opposed by some powerful FHLB presidents. Line up early Wednesday morning at the House Rayburn building:Treasury secretary John Snow will testify before the Financial Services Committee, giving the administration'sviews on better regulating Fannie and Freddie.
10-YEAR TREASURY WATCH: On Thursday, at one point during the day, the yield on the 10-year was 4.6%.On Friday the yield dropped to 4.37%...
LENDER IN FOCUS: Wholesaler American Mortgage Network, San Diego, said it funded $936 millionin home mortgages in August, compared to $1.4 billion for July. Year-to-date, AMN has funded $7.6 billion in homeloans and anticipates that it will fund as much as $12 billion by the time 2003 ends. Average loan fundings perworkday decreased 32% from July to August. The company took in $1.1 billion in new loan applications in Augustcompared to $1.5 billion in July. The company is headed by veteran mortgage banker John M. Robbins.
MORTGAGE PEOPLE: American Mortgage Network has named Jerry Hassler vice president/manager forits new Phoenix regional center. Before joining AmNet, Mr. Hassler was VP/branch manager for New America Financial.Option One has named Allan Lubitz as its chief information officer. Allan joins the H&R Blocksubsidiary from DiTech, an affiliate of GMAC.
MORTGAGE DATA: National Mortgage News has just released its new loan broker database, includinginformation on the top 400 loan brokers and information on 4,000 brokers in total. Also available: top broker producers.For information on the mortgage broker database e-mail:
