The HELOC market is hot, hot, hot. So is the alternative-A market. Finding good, solid statistics on these nichesis not easy. National Mortgage News has just finished compiling a special midyear report on the top-rankedfirms in the two sectors. To order a copy, contact Deartra Todd at
ThomsonMedia.com
Meanwhile, on Friday, Oct. 22, NMN will release a new white paper called "20 (Mostly Private)Mortgage Firms to Keep an Eye On." The new white paper includes analysis, and contact informationon the 20. Included in the white paper is an Excel spreadsheet with the firms' loan volumes. For more informationcontact:
@ThomsonMedia.com
Cendant Corp. chairman Henry Silverman, who has been driven crazy by the volatility inherent inmortgage banking, is finally shedding his mortgage subsidiary, Cendant Mortgage Corp. The unit isn't beingsold. Instead, it's being "spun-off" to Cendant's lucky shareholders. This comes after Cendant failedto ink a deal to sell CMC to Countrywide "We Never Buy Anything" Home Loans. Did anyonereally think Countrywide would pony up $1.2 billion for CMC? Only in Mr. Silverman's dreams. In public commentslast week, Mr. Silverman lamented that Cendant's mortgage company "gets 95% of the attention but only accountsfor 5% of our earnings." For the full story see Monday's NMN...
Well, apparently, there is a criminal probe of Fannie Mae after all. Who says so? Fannie Mae. In lastweek's column we noted that it would be nice if the Justice Department confirmed the unconfirmed reportsof a criminal probe. The Wall Street Journal first broke the news that DOJ was probing Fannie's accountingpractices. But then Office of Housing Enterprise Oversight director Armando Falcon Jr. said he hadnot filed a criminal referral with DOJ. Usually no referral means no probe, unless, of course, another agency (notOFHEO) filed a referral. Confused? Welcome to the club...
Empower!, a division of Fidelity National Financial, says the New Jersey-based Weichert FinancialServices has chosen the company as its loan origination software solution...
Mortgage lender R & G Financial Corp. has agreed to acquire 18 branches from SouthTrust. Thebranches are in Florida and Georgia...
WASHINGTON NEWS: Housing and Urban Development secretary Alphonso Jackson told credit unionexecutives Thursday his "new marching orders" from the president are to increase homeownership abovean initial goal of 5.5 million new minority homeowners, and noted the key role credit unions have played in achievingthe original objective. Jackson, speaking to NCUA's "Access Across America" conference on servingthe underserved, urged credit unions to continue to partner in homeownership efforts. Secretary Jackson also isspeaking at a "No Child Left Behind" town hall meeting on Sunday in Washington. The meeting marks thelaunch of a series of NCLB forums being held across the nation. What are these forums being held for? To, of course,inform parents how they can obtain a better education for their children. Boy, it's a good thing there's not anelection coming up or someone might misconstrue secretary Jackson's efforts as being on the stump for the president.
MORTGAGE PEOPLE: Wholesaler American Mortgage Network has named William Schellhase vicepresident/national subprime sales manager. He will partner with AmNet's regional managers to build subprimesales. William C. Apgar, former commissioner of the Federal Housing Administration, has been namedto the advisory board of AMCO, a Cleveland-based appraisal management company. Deutsche Bank hashired two managing directors to posts in its mortgage-backed securities unit. Neil Ahuja has been namedmanaging director and head of the MBS group, and Jon Roach has been named managing director and head ofmortgage derivative trading.
MORTGAGE DATA/RESEARCH NOTICE: This just in -- NMN has just released a new white paper called"Doc Prep on the Net." The brand-new white paper covers the broad area of document preparation,document delivery and compliance over the Internet. For more details or to order contact Elizabeth Washington at(202) 434-0328 or e-mail:
@ThomsonMedia.com
@ThomsonMedia.com
