Origination

Warehouse lending is becoming less popular with some of the big players who have provided it, but remaining and new market participants find it can be profitable if they can get comfortable with the credit.

SunTrust Banks Inc. beat expectations for fourth-quarter earnings on stronger lending, but mortgage-repurchase costs and a drop in debit-card fees overshadowed the good news.

Sales of existing single-family homes rose in December for the third straight month and Realtors are hoping it could be the start of a long-awaited recovery in the housing market.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has finalized a rule to clarify and strengthen its authority to seek indemnification from its largest lenders for making bad loans.

Even the most well-intentioned lenders sometimes fall short in terms of compliance with certain aspects of the Final Interagency Appraisal and Evaluation Guidelines, most notably when it comes to having policies and procedures in place to evaluate and monitor the ongoing performance of appraisers and having the required supporting documentation to show that the lender is evaluating and monitoring the appraisers.

By now you've read the exclusive on the National Mortgage News website - that Bank of America is halting (for now) cash-out refinancings. Maybe cash-out refis don't account for much of the bank's production. Then again, relatively speaking, there isn't much production left at B of A. In 4Q the bank funded $20 billion in home loans compared to $120 billion at the number one ranked Wells Fargo.

It appears that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are starting to see their market shares erode. The same might be said of the Government National Mortgage Association.

The overall characteristics of jumbo mortgages backing Redwood Trust's latest RMBS are consistent with "high-quality underwriting," according to an unsolicited review of the deal conducted by Standard & Poor's.

Sorry, it doesn't exist. How arrogant of me, or anyone else, to make a definitive statement that something is the "best." Simply put, it would mean that I know every program that's available, have tried and tested them using a large sampling of attendees and then analyzed years of data and statistics.

Bank of America mid-week told its retail loan officers nationwide that the lender will halt, for now, originations of cash-out refinancings, citing what it calls a "surge of refinancing activity" and capacity problems.