Economy

Confidence among homebuilders surged in December to an 11-year high on prospects the election of Donald Trump will translate into a smaller regulatory burden on the industry.

Mortgage rates moved higher for the seventh consecutive week, a sign that the markets are still in flux after the presidential election, Freddie Mac said.

When Barack Obama leaves office on Jan. 20, Democratic appointees across the government are expected to follow him out the door, to be replaced by officials chosen by Donald Trump. Not Mel Watt — he isn't planning to go anywhere.

The forecast for mortgage origination volume moved down for the first quarter of 2017 in the wake of the second interest rate hike by the Federal Reserve in a decade, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

BOK Financial will take a roughly $17 million earnings hit due to a change in the fair value of its mortgage servicing rights and a corresponding hedge.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will replace the expiring Home Affordable Mortgage Program with a new loss mitigation option called the Flex Modification.

The surge in mortgage rates since the November election is expected to offset the increase to lenders' short-term funding costs following the Federal Open Markets Committee's 25-basis-point increase to the federal funds rate.

Higher rates and lower consumer confidence are expected to put a damper on existing home sales in 2017, according to the National Association of Realtors.

The mortgage interest deduction has been a pillar of U.S. housing policy for more than a century, but Congress appears ready to consider significant changes to it that some industry players worry could effectively render it moot.

The inventory of starter homes is shrinking at an increasingly faster pace, leaving first-time homebuyers with fewer and more expensive options, according to Trulia.

Interest rates may climb to 3% on 10-year Treasuries by next year as deficits and inflation rise under a Donald Trump presidency and that would hurt the housing market, said Jeffrey Gundlach, chief investment officer of DoubleLine Capital.

Southern National Bancorp of Virginia in McLean has agreed to buy Eastern Virginia Bankshares in Glen Allen.

It is going take some time before it comes to fruition, but the Federal Housing Finance Agency got the ball rolling Tuesday on pushing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to begin purchasing manufactured housing loans.

Stanford Kurland will step down from his role as CEO of PennyMac Financial Services and its affiliate PennyMac Mortgage Investment Trust and assume the role of executive chairman of both as part of a broader executive reorganization.

One step the government can take to strengthening housing is to create a unified office dedicated to housing finance and policy, streamlining and making more efficient existing agencies and programs.

Millennials are the most optimistic about the state of the U.S. real estate market, while most American express favorable opinions about housing, according to Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency finalized a rule Tuesday that will create a "duty to serve" for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to help low- and moderate- income consumers, including encouraging a secondary market for manufactured housing loans.

The national foreclosure inventory decreased by nearly a third in October from a year earlier, CoreLogic reported.

When Donald Trump announced his choice for Treasury secretary last month, he called Steven Mnuchin a "world-class financier," citing business successes like his profitable turnaround of a California bank.

SoFi Lending Corp.'s securitization of its student loan refis for high net worth individuals is now a model for its recent expansion into super prime jumbo mortgages.