Originations

This past weekend I had a booth at a Senior Expo. It was held at a religious institution in our neighborhood. Typically, I would not attend one of these expos and I definitely wouldn’t have a booth.

Rising interest rates took their toll on mortgage applications with new business volume falling by almost 8% for the week ending March 25, according to new figures compiled by the Mortgage Bankers Association.

The critical HUD IG report last year that recently led to a servicing mortgagee letter related to situations in which borrowers fail to meet their tax and insurance payment obligations has likely future implications for origination practices as well.

The nation's title insurance companies wrote $9.61 billion of new premiums last year, a slight gain from 2009, according to figures compiled by the American Land Title Association.

Mortgage technology vendor Ellie Mae on Tuesday priced its initial public offering, laying out plans to raise between $40 million and $60 million.

U.S. District Court Judge Beryl Howell who is presiding over a lawsuit aimed at preventing federal broker compensation rules from taking effect April 1 said Tuesday she will rule "shortly" on the matter but offered no clear timetable.

The drive to reform the government-sponsored enterprises is raising two questions that could fundamentally reshape the way borrowers obtain mortgages: will a revamp effectively eliminate the 30-year fixed rate mortgage, and would that be a good thing?

It's not quite a mortgage technology conference without the release of at least one loan origination system – and several upgrades.

Congressional demands for the Federal Housing Administration to improve transparency, data accuracy, and legacy technology platforms have been backed by additional resources allocated to the effort.

Home values are falling in most major U.S. cities – except the nation's capital -- and the average price in four of them are at their lowest level in 11 years, according to the newly released Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller home price index.

Hudson City Bancorp, a top ranked mortgage lender in the Northeast, said it has completed a "restructuring" of its balance sheet that reduced its high-cost borrowings and should allow for "increased future net interest income."

On Tuesday morning a Federal judge will hear arguments from the National Association of Mortgage Brokers and the Federal Reserve concerning a new motion filed by NAMB seeking a temporary restraining order against the central bank's loan officer compensation rule.

ATLANTIC CITY, NJ—Even though investors welcomed the two recently-originated private-label MBS that have been done since the downturn, the non-government secondary market investor in general remains “in hiding,” a member of a panel on the future of the secondary market told attendees at the Regional Conference of Mortgage Bankers Associations.

If there is one lesson that any natural disaster, such as the earthquake in Japan, should teach a business owner, is that one must be prepared for anything. The reach of problems caused by the earthquake has hit this country, and I am not talking about radiation.

Federal banking regulators began leaking copies of their much anticipated mortgage risk retention rules on Monday — with very few surprises contained in the final proposed language except for one: where Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac fit in.

KBW Inc., New York, on Monday placed 14 real estate investment trusts in its first ever 'REIT Dividend Honor Roll.'

J.I. Kislak Mortgage LLC, Miami Lakes, Fla., on Monday named industry veteran Felix Beck as an advisor to the fast growing company.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development late last week issued RESPA guidance to help lenders and settlement service providers fill out the 'Good Faith Estimate' when the Federal Reserve's loan officer compensation rule goes into effect later this week.

A leading indicator of existing home sales rose 2.1% in February after falling for two consecutive months, but economists at the National Association of Realtors aren't optimistic about a surge in sales this spring.

Among the states, North Dakota will recover most quickly from the housing downturn, according to Tree.com Inc.'s LendingTree.