Underwriting

Climate change is increasing the frequency of wildfires, hurricanes and severe winter storms; yet in areas most vulnerable to them, property value growth exceeds the national average, a new report finds.

The move builds on the government-sponsored enterprise’s previous program that facilitated the collection of more rent payment records from tenants who work with its multifamily borrowers.

This latest campaign comes as application volume is down by 53% from a year ago, while mortgage rates are 2.59 percentage points higher since the start of 2022.

The rate was 30 basis points higher compared with 2019 due to the record level of mortgage origination during the pandemic, according to Aces Quality Management.

The company, which has ties to three major credit bureaus, is working with a former Fannie Mae executive in its efforts to reduce consumer costs.

While rate and term refinancings had the largest drop in volume, credit scores for cash-outs are 33 points lower than one year prior, indicating that these borrowers need financial liquidity, a Black Knight report found.

However, in line with promises housing agencies have made to be cautious in their expansion of underwriting, new rules around financing for properties with accessory dwelling units still have several guardrails.

Talk'uments already enables English and Spanish speakers to understand their documents and will soon add Vietnamese, Korean and Tagalog.

The wholesale product has a $2.5 million limit, is indexed to SOFR and meets the qualified mortgage requirements.

But with fewer mortgage transactions forecast for the next few years, it is unlikely that record will be topped any time soon, the American Land Title Association said.