Origination

Mortgage industry hiring and new job appointments for the week ending Jan. 6.

Weakness in the energy sector and a surge in new construction are pushing up vacancy rates at offices and hotels, leading to a spike in delinquencies on loans tied to them. The safer bet, bankers say, is lending on industrial properties.

The Senate Banking Committee is scheduled to hold a hearing Jan. 12 on the nomination of Dr. Ben Carson as Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The lending arm of U.S. Department of Agriculture guaranteed 3,439 single-family construction loans in the first quarter of fiscal year 2017, which ended Dec. 31, but just nine of those loans involved its new single-close construction-to-permanent financing option.

Former Jefferies LLC managing director Jesse Litvak "lied to his customers" about the prices of mortgage-backed securities, a prosecutor told jurors as the U.S tries for a second time to win a conviction that sticks.

Demographics are shifting, creating more prospective minority homebuyers than ever before. But predominant underwriting processes and these would-be borrowers' financial backgrounds are holding them back.

Mortgage credit availability grew for the fourth consecutive month in December, the Mortgage Bankers Association reported.

Mortgage interest rates dropped for the first time since the presidential election in the first week of the new year, Freddie Mac reported.

Deutsche Bank is considering an unusual approach to providing relief to subprime mortgage borrowers as part of a $7.2 billion settlement with the U.S. government: lending money to private equity firms and hedge funds.

Now that it has completed the purchase of its rival private mortgage insurer United Guaranty from AIG, Arch Capital Group plans to trim the sales force while avoiding service disruptions.