Mortgages

The days of mortgage companies embarking on large, expensive and open-ended information technology projects are long gone and executives are focusing their efforts on smaller-scale projects that produce faster results, according to a panel at the Mortgage Bankers Association Commercial/Multifamily Servicing and Technology Conference this week in Dallas.

Encore Capital Group, a business that buys portfolios of consumer debt, announced that it purchased tax refinancer Propel Financial Services this month for $187 million.

It is no surprise that the law of supply and demand drives costs upward or downward depending on the trajectory of the major component. The same principle holds true in the rental market.

Now, the CFPB will step-in and investigate reports of non-compliant mortgage servicing companies, and possibly enforce hefty fines.

Lenders that order appraisals to support mortgage loans may be tempted, as a cost control measure or otherwise, to limit the number of approaches to value that an appraiser uses in performing the appraisal. But those lenders, and their AMCs, should proceed with caution. The uniform appraisal standards, known as USPAP, recognize three main approaches to value: the sales-comparison approach, the cost approach, and the income approach.

Bank of America is in the market with a $2 billion package of mortgage servicing rights tied to loans that reside in private-label securitizations, according to bidders and investors briefed on the package.

Washington is squeezing small banks and chasing off the private equity investors who could help them, financier Wilbur Ross says.

Old Republic International Corp. has taken the next step in separating out its private mortgage insurance and consumer credit indemnity insurance units by selling 20.6% of Republic Financial Indemnity Group to an investor group headed by ORI president Christopher Nard.

Political races bring on all sorts of silly comparisons so why not take a stab at asking this: who would produce a more profitable mortgage banking company: President Obama or Mitt Romney?

The National Association of Realtors reported that sales of existing homes rose 3.4% in April to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.62 million units.

Changing market dynamics are putting more stress and constraints on commercial real estate servicing, causing processors to reevaluate their business models and strategies, according to a panel at the Mortgage Bankers Association commercial mortgage servicing and technology show this week in Dallas.

According to Lender Processing Services’ ‘First Look’ report from its database of nearly 40 million mortgage loans, the month-over-month delinquency rate rose 0.4% in April, bringing the overall delinquency rate of loans 30 or more days past due (but not in foreclosure) to 7.12%.

Bank servicers are doing what they can to avoid depressing home prices, by focusing on reducing foreclosures rather than flooding the market with their backlog of properties.

In baseball, there are the written rules and the unwritten rules on how to play the game. Many of these unwritten rules are things you don't do on the field, in other words they make up a code of behavior.

The chief economist for the National Multi Housing Council said the strength of the recovery of the multifamily portion of the commercial real estate market has attracted both debt and equity capital to finance these properties.

Declines in the mortgage delinquency rates on all one-to-four unit residential loans outstanding during the first quarter add another layer of affirmation to previous data that suggest some level of market stabilization.

Residential Capital Corp. last week began mailing out letters to its 2.5 million mortgage customers informing them of the firm’s bankruptcy filing but also cautioning them about keeping their loans current.

A top reason why borrowers continue to be intimidated by the prospect of facing their lender-servicers is fear they will be taken advantage of.

The House of Representative late last week passed a defense authorization bill that includes an expansion of the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act to shield more military families from foreclosure while increasing penalties on lenders for compliance violations.

Clinton Group Inc., an investment manager which says it is one of the largest shareholders in Radian Group Inc., is calling on the Philadelphia-based private mortgage insurer to put itself up for sale.