Technology

The end of Google Advisor Mortgage is another missed opportunity by a larger technology player trying to make its mark in the mortgage industry.

Mortgage companies have added at least 3,000 full-time employees to their payrolls since September -- to keep up with refinancings -- but held off on hiring in December, according to new government figures released Friday morning.

National home prices fell for the fifth consecutive year as they were down 4.7% at the end of 2011 compared to December 2010, according to a CoreLogic report.

After significantly reducing its geographic footprint in November, Google “discontinued” its mortgage rate advertising platform Wednesday, just two years after the search engine entered the online rate search and lead generation market.

Ellie Mae created a new chief information officer position and hired David Robbins to fill the new role, the mortgage technology vendor announced.

The national vacancy rate for single-family homes fell in 2011 as foreclosures slowed and sales of empty units increased by 14% over the past four quarters, according to new government figures released Tuesday morning.

Economists at Fiserv expect rising home sales will lead to higher values in half of all U.S. metropolitan areas over the 12-month period ending September 30.

RiskFinder Distress enables users to track and analyze key distress events throughout the life cycle of a loan. This computer product provides investors and lenders the information needed to evaluate risk, determine the impact of distress sales on loss severity estimates, drive loss mitigation strategies and identify markets that are starting to recover.

Positive housing data from the end of 2011 nudged the average weekly rate for a 30-year fixed rate mortgage back upward by 10 basis points to 3.98% in Freddie Mac's primary market survey, reversing a three-week trend of record-setting lows.

Despite lingering challenges real estate agents and lenders currently face when selling foreclosed and bank owned properties, these homes continue to make up a high percentage of all sales nationwide through the third quarter of 2011 even though it's lower than the previous quarter.