Originations

FBR Capital Markets late Friday said it has halted coverage of The PMI Group, Walnut Creek, Calif., the nation's second largest MI firm.

LOS ANGELES—Bank of America is working “very hard” on a short sale-to-lease program for distressed borrowers who don't qualify for government-backed refinance programs.

Agency mortgage-backed security prepayments continued to ramp up in the latest report but the increases generally came closer to matching expectations than the previous month.

The legacy that Fred Arnold hopes to leave to the world when he retires is how he has been helping other people grow their businesses and helping people grow their lives. "If I can do that, then I'll be just fine in business."

Even though the implementation of the Secure and Fair Enforcement of Mortgage Licensing Act was supposed to create a national set of standards for all mortgage originators, concerns that mortgage brokers and mortgage bankers are currently on an uneven playing field when it comes to becoming a registered loan officer persist.

Home prices fell 1.1% in September from the prior month and the outlook for the coming winter months – when sales tend to slow – are anything but positive, according to a new report from CoreLogic.

Consumers continue to be pessimistic about home prices – with many saying that values still have further to fall – but they also believe, overwhelmingly, that now is a good time to buy.

A new Urban Land Institute report intending to open a yearlong dialogue about the future of real estate in the changing economy finds a world struggling to adapt to new market realities.

For over 60 years, the Rural Housing Service, part of the Department of Agriculture's Rural Development Mission Area, has been supporting the community development needs of rural America.

The mortgage bust has inspired a big wave of rethinking about the value of home owning. The mantra of "the American dream of homeownership" has often been turned into a statement like "not everyone should be a homeowner."

A decision to restore the $729,750 maximum loan limit on government-backed loans likely will be made by House and Senate leaders -- and not the appropriators, according to industry sources following the issue.

The U.S. mortgage insurance business at Genworth Financial Inc., Richmond, Va., nearly halved its year-over-year loss in the third quarter as new flow delinquencies declined 14% from the previous year and new insurance written was up by 13% in the same timeframe.

American International Group, New York, reported a net loss of $4.1 million, which includes a $931 million decline in the fair market value of AIG's holdings in Maiden Lane III and a $43 million decline in the fair market value of its subsidiary SunAmerica's holdings in Maiden Lane II.

When we take full responsibility for our behavior—when we really own what we do and the impact of our —we immediately impose a range of extremely hardy pressures on ourselves to do the right thing. These pressures range from wanting to be proud of a job well done to wishing not to be humiliated or punished for doing the wrong thing.

Redwood Trust, the only firm to publicly issue jumbo MBS the past two years, earned just $1 million in the third quarter, but its acquisition of nonconforming product in the secondary market jumped by 166%.

Mortgage companies pared their payrolls by just 300 full-time employees in September, compared to 3,400 cuts the prior month, according to new government figures released Friday morning.

Ally Financial Corp. this week announced what it calls "modest" layoffs in its correspondent lending division, but declined to specify how many workers were cut.

European concerns' effect on the larger market drove the average weekly rate for a 30-year fixed rate mortgage down to 4%, a level Freddie Mac said is the second-lowest ever.

Efforts to reinstate the $729,750 maximum loan limit for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and FHA loans has garnered the support of 137 House members, including 25 Republicans.

Commercial and multifamily mortgage originations in the third quarter were almost double what they were for the same period last year, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.