Data and information management

Lender Processing Services said in its “first look” report that the U.S. loan delinquency now stands at 6.80%.

A report from Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reviewing mortgage banking results for 4Q12 notes that while things were generally positive, concerns about the sustainability of the current environment have increased.

Veros believes the five markets which will see the most improvement are: Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana; San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont; Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale; San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, Calif.; and Midland, Texas.

House prices rose 0.3% in January from the prior month, according to Lender Processing Services.

Life company commercial mortgage investments had a return of 7.48% for all of 2012, including 1.85% in the fourth quarter, according to the LifeComps Commercial Mortgage Loan Index.

Home sales in Florida are up over 10% in February compared with the same month in 2012, Florida Realtors reported.

Wells Fargo was the top originator for commercial mortgage-backed securities and loans sold to other investors.

Sales of previously owned homes rose 0.8% in February from the prior month as single-family sales were flat and condominium sales jumped 9%.

The seasonally adjusted HPI published by the Federal Housing Finance Agency Thursday morning shows that prices rose 0.6% in January after a 0.5% increase in December.

There was $11.4 billion of premiums written last year by the nation’s title insurance underwriters, up from $9.5 billion one year prior.

The level of home equity held by America’s senior citizens is now at the highest level since the second quarter of 2009, a beneficiary of the recovery in the housing market.

Consumer credit quality remains healthy through the end of February as all rate categories tracked by S&P/Experian decreased on an annual basis.

Collateralized mortgage obligation issuance so far this year has been stronger than last, but volume levels are still shy of what it was in 2011.

Single-family housing starts edged up by 0.5% in February and have been relatively flat since December.

During the fourth quarter of 2012, CoreLogic said approximately 200,000 homeowners returned to a state of positive equity.

While private-equity firms are helping real estate values recover from the worst slump since the 1930s by cutting the supply of foreclosures for sale, they’re also crowding the market with rentals.

Housing forecasters remain optimistic that property values will continue to increase over the next several years and exceed pre-bubble rates by 2017.

Due to their access to capital, the big national builders are getting lots of orders and they are scooping up building lots.

Canadian existing home sales fell in February from the previous month on drops in Vancouver and Toronto.

Redfin said Phoenix had 540 of what it has defined as flash sales, a home going into contract 24 hours or less after listing.