Law and regulation

The CFPB's powers to initiate enforcement actions are nearly boundless.

The New York Department of Financial Services has announced new title insurance rates for consumers who refinance their mortgage.

WASHINGTON — A new mortgage disclosure regime due to take effect on Aug. 1 is unlikely to cause closing delays, according to Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Richard Cordray.

Most banks appear to be coping well with the CFPB's ability-to-repay rule for mortgages, but the burden is falling harder on community banks. A new proposal that would allow more small lenders to grant home loans to borrowers with high levels of debt could help.

WASHINGTON — The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau filed a lawsuit on Monday against an Ohio-based loan administrator and its owner for allegedly deceptively marketing services that claimed to save consumers money on their mortgage while any actual savings was offset by high fees.

In response to the guidance offered by one of our commenters recently, Freddie Mac sets the record straight about their review process.

A lot of bankers want on-balance-sheet mortgages declared ultrasafe under federal rules, and Wells Fargo executive Brad Blackwell explains why he thinks it's in their self-interest more than ever to live up to their arguments in favor of such a policy.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the Department of Justice are taking a renewed interest in redlining, the practice of lenders charging more for products or excluding altogether minorities within certain geographic areas — and their findings may be surprising.

Most title professionals will be prepared when the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau implements its TILA-RESPA Integrated Disclosure rule on Aug. 1, according to the American Land Title Association.

Investor-owned ratings agencies would send a message to mutual fund shareholders, retirement plan participants and other investors that steps have been taken to avoid repeating the inaccurate ratings that contributed so heavily to the financial crisis.

Fannie Mae will pay the Treasury Department $1.8 billion after reporting net income of $1.9 billion for the first quarter.

Ocwen Financial failed a test to determine whether it had notified borrowers of missing or incomplete documents for loan modifications in a timely manner, according to the national mortgage settlement monitor.

Implementing minimum requirements for appraisal management companies raise opportunities for varied and potentially inconsistent requirements state-by-state.

Wholesale lenders and their brokers are finding preparing for the new mortgage disclosures that take effect in August especially tricky.

The CFPB found that more than 26 million consumers are effectively "credit invisible" because they have no credit record and another 19 million are "unscored" because they have an insufficient or stale credit history. But it's unclear how the CFPB plans to tackle the issue.

President Obama's administration has joined Democratic and Republican lawmakers in attacking potential raises for the top executives of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

The silver lining of the market crash was a unique opportunity for non-legislative reform that would not have otherwise come to bear.

Two House Financial Services Committee members introduced a bipartisan bill late last week that is designed to give lenders breathing room when new disclosure rules go into effect on Aug. 1.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has rescinded a policy designed to help certain widowed spouses of reverse mortgage borrowers avoid foreclosure.

The Federal Housing Administration Single Family Housing Policy Handbook will now come into effect on Sept. 14, the Department of Housing and Urban Development announced Friday.