Law and regulation

The Federal Housing Finance Agency is planning to issue a final rule in the next 12 months to require Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to better serve underserved markets, including manufactured housing, the agency said Thursday.

A handful of moderate Democrats are supporting a controversial bill to restructure the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and are expected to help the House Financial Services Committee approve the legislation.

Community bankers merit more regulatory relief, particularly those that hold mortgage originations. That was a key message from James Bullard, St. Louis Fed President, during a community banking conference in St. Louis hosted by the Federal Reserve Board and the Conference of State Bank Supervisors.

WASHINGTON — The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is working with other regulators on examiner guidance to help ensure that the agencies enforce new mortgage disclosures in a "corrective" manner, not a "punitive" one, Director Richard Cordray said Tuesday.

With the implementation date for the TILA-RESPA Integrated Disclosures just days away, here's a look at some of the finishing touches the mortgage industry is making to its technology and training preparations.

A bipartisan group of housing experts is seeking to inject more discussion about the mortgage market into presidential campaigns.

The key to housing finance reform is a new securitization model that allows the private sector to price and absorb the majority of housing credit risk.

The most recent outcry came from four housing groups that warned lawmakers last week that the proposal by the Federal Housing Finance Agency "would make harmful changes" to the FHLB membership rules.

Fannie Mae will be facing more competition in the HFA market as Freddie Mac and the FHLBs become more active.

Lenders that allow borrowers to shop for third-party settlement services face new liability, as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's integrated mortgage disclosure rules will let borrowers sue over problems with vendor lists.

GOP presidential contender Jeb Bush unveiled a plan to reform the regulatory process, including at agencies like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Officials signaled that Hudson City Savings Bank's nearly $33 million settlement over redlining charges is only the first in what is likely to be a string of other cases.

Federal officials on Thursday ordered Hudson City Savings Bank to pay more than $27 million to resolve redlining allegations, the largest order of its kind and one that is likely to put larger banks on notice that redlining cases will be aggressively pursued.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's method for detecting disparate impact discrimination can overestimate potential bias, resulting in higher payments for lenders cited by the agency, according to internal CFPB documents.

From due diligence and portfolio analysis to strategies for compliance and raising capital, the rapidly-evolving market for buying and selling distressed mortgage assets has created both challenges and opportunities for investors, servicers and portfolio managers.

Although new HMDA data shows no negative effects from CFPB mortgage rules that went into effect last year, industry representatives argue it isn't showing the full picture.

The number of mortgage originations dropped 31% to 6 million in 2014 due largely to a decline in refinancing as interest rates increased, according to a report issued Tuesday by the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council.

Despite pledges last year to move “aggressively” to implement new credit scoring models at the government-sponsored enterprises, the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s effort appears to have stalled.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau finalized a rule Monday that will make it easier for some community banks to make qualified mortgages.

Banks that want more explicit regulatory guidance on rules requiring managers to keep "skin in the game" with deals for collateralized loan obligations may be forced to keep waiting.