As the economy makes gradual steps in its recovery effort and the unemployment rate is slowly improving from all-time record highs, individuals nationwide still believe in the "American dream" of owning a home.

Big news in the online lead generation world—Google is no longer selling mortgage rate advertising to lenders in all but four states and the District of Columbia.

Thanks for checking out “Mortgage Bytes,” the new blog of Mortgage Technology magazine.The genesis of this blog, and its name, goes back more than a year ago, shortly after I came on board as managing editor of the magazine. With all of the product releases, technology integrations and company hire news coming out of the mortgage tech sector, I wanted a way to bring all of these briefs together in one place for readers to quickly get informed on the latest industry updates.

Successful selling almost always requires the salesperson to obtain information from the prospect to facilitate a sale. Regardless of your product or service, obtaining insightful facts about the prospect’s needs, concerns and desires should serve as a guide on how to accomplish a favorable outcome. The problem that always presents itself is determining how to effectively probe and extract information without sounding like a C.I.A. interrogator whose next question might involve waterboarding.

Another big year for multifamily construction could push housing starts up 13% in 2012 after posting a 4% increase last year, according to a new forecast from Wells Fargo Securities.

November was the second best month of last year in terms of new private mortgage insurance written, but new applications received declined from October, according to the Mortgage Insurance Cos. of America.

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network has extended the deadline for financial institutions to adopt the agency's new Currency Transaction Report and Suspicious Activity Report until the end of March 2013.

Despite a sluggish mortgage origination market, an energetic atmosphere surrounds technology advances in this sector of specialty home finance. “There’s never been a more robust selection of tech for originators,” said Jeff Taylor, president of Wendover Consulting.

Between foreclosures and paying down their loans through “cash-in” refinancings, the nation’s mortgagors are continuing to whittle down their housing debt—and that’s bad news for the nation’s servicers.

Since launching its short sale module in November 2009, the default servicing technology provider Equator said approximately 1.2 million short sales have been facilitated through its platform.

A leading indicator of future home sales jumped 7.3% in the month ofNovember to its highest level in over 19 months, according to theNational Association of Realtors.

Insight Lending Solutions, the developer of the PriceMyLoan automated underwriting system and pricing engine, has relaunched and rebranded its loan origination system.

National Bank of Kansas City used to depend on UPS to send and receive mortgage documents that required multiple wet-ink signatures and section sign-offs. Now the entire signature and disclosure process can be done electronically with an e-signature application from DocuSign. This has enabled the bank to avoid prolonged closing times, some of which used to stretch to more than 30 days, incurring hundreds of dollars in weekly fees levied by the larger banks to which National sells its loans.

How well a tool performs depends on how well it's used. Bank of York in South Carolina found that out this summer when Wolters Kluwer Financial Services conducted a review of the bank's use of the vendor's ComplianceOne loan origination and deposit systems, which Bank of York brought into production four years ago.

Zillow is projecting that home values across the country are expected to have gone down approximately $700 billion in 2011, which would be 35% less than the $1.1 trillion that was lost in 2010.

Mary Joine Dum, a leading expert on the use of computers in real estate appraisal, died on Dec. 15 in Brentwood, Calif., after suffering a series of strokes. She was 80 years old.

The parent company of United Wholesale Mortgage appointed Paul Orlando as its chief information officer and Bill Van Nort as chief technology officer.

MortgageKeeper, the anonymous referral service that helps lenders and counseling agencies connect struggling home owners with qualified sources of assistance, is ending the year with a bang.

During the 2011 Mortgage Technology Conference, MT convened its advisory board for a Q&A roundtable discussion about the latest and upcoming trends in the industry, which was published in the December issue of Mortgage Technology.

Loan origination system provider Ellie Mae added another product to its arsenal of mortgage technology software as it seeks to root itself deeper into its clients’ lending operations.