Mortgage Servicing News articles from October 2001

Mortgage Servicing News archives from October 2001

Not Over Until It's Over.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
October 1, 2001... Since rates on fixed-rate mortgage loans dipped below the 7% mark in August, refinancing volume has picked up steam again, and analysts see no end in sight. In fact, Morgan Stanley Dean Witter's Kenneth Posner says another 10 to 15 basis...

Hammered HomeSide 'On the Block'.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... It's been a cruel summer for HomeSide Lending here, the nation's sixth largest residential servicer. Not only is the foreign-owned mortgage banker on the auction block, but its parent bank has written down is value by a stunning $2.2...

Slowdown Hits FHA Loans.(Statistical Data Included)
October 1, 2001... The slowing economy and mounting job layoffs are really taking their toll on the Federal Housing Administration single-family loan program and the impact is showing up in second-quarter delinquency numbers. The Mortgage Bankers Association...

2001 Delinquency Rate.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
October 1, 2001... 2nd Quarter 1st Quarter Conventional 2.93% 2.77% FHA: 10.79% 10.00% VA: 7.63% 7.22% Source: MBA. Percentage of loans 30 or more days past due. Copyright c 2001 Thomson...

Bank of America Offers $26B Subprime Portfolio.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Bank of America, Charlotte, N.C., is auctioning off $26 billion in subprime servicing rights as well as the Jacksonville, Fla.-based platform of its EquiCredit unit. As Mortgage Servicing News went to press this month, no deal had been...

Top Subprime servicers at 6/30/01.(Statistical Data Included)
October 1, 2001... (Dollars in Millions) Servicing Rank Organization Name 6/30/2001 1 CitiFinancial/Associates (E), Baltimore, MD ...

Account Numbers Can Be Recorded.(borrower's account number on deeds, etc.)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Placing a borrower's loan account number on a deed of trust or other mortgage loan documents that are publicly recorded does not violate Federal privacy laws, Federal regulators concluded as this edition of MSN was going to press. "It is...

Growth Leads Countrywide To Build New Servicing Center Near L.A.(Countrywide Home Loans)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Countrywide Home Loans will build a new loan servicing center in Lancaster, Calif., that will bring about 500 jobs to this high-desert community on the northern edge of Los Angeles County. Almost all of the jobs will be new positions needed...

Wilshire Acquires Old Kent Portfolio.(Wilshire Credit Corp.)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Wilshire Credit Corp., a subsidiary of Wilshire Financial Services Group, has purchased a $178 million portfolio of subprime, first-lien mortgages from Old Kent. Jay Memmott, president and CEO of Wilshire Credit, said the acquisition of...

Consolidation Fuels Rapid Growth for Mega-Servicers.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... The three largest servicers now each manage more than $400 billion in home loan receivables, an industry first. And that is not the only consolidation milestone that was reached in the second quarter. The top five each manage more than $300...

Top servicers at June 30, 2001.(Statistical Data Included)
October 1, 2001... (Dollars in Millions) (part 1 of 2) Servicing Rank Organization Name Location 6/30/2001 1 Washington Mutual (1) ...

A Silver Lining.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... It is the best of times. It is the worst of times. Depending upon your perspective, 2001 has been either a great year for the mortgage servicing industry or a traumatic one. Let's start with the bad news first. A 10-month-old refinancing boom...

Retention Strategies Need Attention.
October 1, 2001... Steven Kropper is co-founder and CEO of Domania Inc. (www.domania.com), a Boston-based financial and marketing services software company that provides customer acquisition and retention products to banks, mortgage lenders and Realtors. This...

The Industry's Dilemma: Over-Capacity When Refinancing Slows Down.
October 1, 2001... Two of the most frequent complaints I hear about mortgage banking is that it's a tight-margined business and that there is too much "over-capacity" in the industry. Says who? Well, plenty of folks: Wall Street investment bankers, analysts,...

Midland Is Biggest CMBS Servicer.(Midland Loan Services)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Midland Loan Services has emerged the leading servicer of commercial mortgage-backed securities, with a CMBS servicing portfolio of $45.1 billion as of June 2001, based on a survey of nine firms by the Mortgage Bankers Association. The...

Special servicing provides glimpse of problem Loans.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Total Volume: $1.4 billion Share of CMBS Master/Primary Servicing Total: .7% Share of loans on which firms were named special servicer: 1.3% Source: MBA survey of nine CMBS servicers. Copyright c 2001 Thomson Financial....

AppraisalTrac Integrates HVE.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Dattar Systems Inc., has announced integration of its AppraisalTrac Web-based collateral services workflow application, with Freddie Mac's Home Value Explorer (HVE) provided by DataQuick Information Systems. The integration enables...

Jankowski To Lead Default Group.(First American Real Estate Information Services names Dennis Jankowski, senior vice president of National Default Outsourcing)
October 1, 2001... First American Real Estate Information Services has named Dennis Jankowski as senior vice president of National Default Outsourcing. In his new position, Mr. Jankowski will direct First American's National Default Outsourcing operations and...

GMAC Partners With French Firm.(GMAC Commercial Holding Corp., Groupe Bazin)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... GMAC Commercial Holding Corp., a commercial real estate financier and servicer, has entered into a strategic alliance with Groupe Bazin, a French company that provides real estate services. The main objective of the alliance is "to meet the...

Threat of Loan Fraud Requires Lenders To Show Caution.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... While technology has helped make the origination and servicing of loans faster and more cost efficient, it has also made it a lot easier for sophisticated, yet unscrupulous borrowers to commit fraud. Mortgage fraud has increased nationally...

Bankruptcy Bill Faces Opposition.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Only one quarter of Americans say President Bush should sign bankruptcy reform legislation being advanced by the lending industry, according to a Consumer Federation of America survey. The legislation would make it more difficult for...

Freddie Rewards Tier One Lenders.(Freddie Mac )(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Freddie Mac rewarded its "Tier One" loan servicers with $2.7 million in incentives last year, a company official said at the Western States Loan Servicing Conference in Las Vegas. Ken Harrison, director of customer outreach and marketing, said...

Lawyers Now Getting Higher Foreclosure Fees.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... In June, Fannie Mae raised the allowable attorney fees for foreclosure-related matters in 48 states in its first comprehensive change in the attorney fees and foreclosure timelines since 1998. The three jurisdictions where attorney and...

Fannie Foundation Aids Storm Victims.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... The Fannie Mae Foundation has donated $50,000 to help victims of two natural disasters. The Fannie Mae Foundation announced it will give a $25,000 emergency grant to provide housing for the flooding associated with Tropical Storm Allison...

Demand Keeps Growing for International Servicing Expertise.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... International issuance of Commercial Mortgage-Backed Securities (CMBS) has taken off in recent years ($8.1 billion for the first half of 2001, according to the MBA) giving rise to opportunities for international servicing. However, it is not...

Bill Would Require Credit Disclosure.(Senate Banking Committee bill)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Two Senate Banking Committee members are co-sponsoring a bill that requires mortgage lenders and credit reporting agencies to disclosure credit scores to mortgage applicants. Sponsored by Senators Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and Wayne Allard,...

Regulators Clear GSE Capital Rule.(Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight; government sponsored enterprises)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... A federal supervisory agency that oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac has finally earned its stripes by getting a "state-of-the-art" capital standard past its final regulatory hurdle. It has taken the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise...

Distribution of MBS Market by Securities.(mortgage-backed securities)(Brief Article)(Illustration)(Statistical Data Included)
October 1, 2001... Over 8.0%: 4.5% 8.0%: 7.2% 7.5%: 14.9% 7.0%: 25.5% 6.5%: 34.5% 6.0%: 13% Under 6.0%: 0.5% Source: Morgan Stanley Copyright c 2001 Thomson Financial. All Rights...

Is HomeSide Alone? Rumors Point Toward More Writedowns.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Thanks to a new round of servicing-related writedowns, HomeSide Lending, the nation's sixth largest residential servicer, is worth $2.2 billion less than it was six months ago (see related story, page 1). Not only have the massive...

Verification Tools Designed To Combat Fraud Problem.
October 1, 2001... While it may be difficult to quantify the losses caused by fraud in the mortgage industry, it's easy to see why lenders want to avoid it. Some new tools are now available to make that easier to do. Experian has released the second...

NetUpdate Acquires Digital Signature Company.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... NetUpdate Inc. has announced it has purchased Seattle-based DocuTouch Corp., a document management and digital signatures firm. The newly acquired technology will be made a part of the NetUpdate Transaction Platform. With the DocuTouch...

Cost of Hedging Rate Risk Can Eat Into Your Income.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Recent writedowns in the value of mortgage servicing portfolios, most notably the $450 million hit that HomeSide took, remind lenders how crucial it is to hedge against interest rate risk. For the most part, the mega-servicers have done pretty...

Refi Mania Equals Record Issuance of Mortgage Securities.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
October 1, 2001... Fueled by a refinancing boom and strong home sales, issuance of mortgage-related securities surged to a record $664.2 billion during the first half of this year, more than double last year's first-half issuance. The first-half tally topped...

Mortgage Insurance Defaults Outpace Cures This Year.(Brief Article)(Statistical Data Included)
October 1, 2001... During the first seven months of 2001, the nation's mortgage insurance companies reported 260,000 new defaults and 213,410 cures. That gave the industry a cure-to-default ratio of just 82%, similar to last year's level, but well below the...

Mortgage insurance cures and defaults.(Brief Article)(Illustration)(Statistical Data Included)
October 1, 2001... Year Cures Defaults Ratio 1996 297,950 327,629 90.9% 1997 337,067 360,068 93.6% 1998 351,438 383,041 91.7% 1999 207,313 218,565 94.9% 2000 298,534 374,754 79.7% Source:...

...But MI Firms Post Strong Profits.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... The four publicly-traded companies whose primary business is mortgage insurance all reported strong earnings growth in the second quarter, as the industry is benefiting from the record production year for lenders. Radian Group Inc.,...

Special Report: E-Payments.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Processing payments electronically has been a goal of major lenders for several years, and the progress toward that goal has been substantial. Increasingly, lenders find that consumers want to pay their monthly home loan bill online or via an...

Princeton Reorganizes To Focus on Its Business and Consumer Clients.(Princeton eCom)
October 1, 2001... Princeton eCom, a firm that provides electronic payment and billing services, has adopted a new organizational structure that creates two new divisions: electronic billing solutions and consumer and payment solutions. "The new structure...

Refi Tool Added to ABN AMRO Site.(ABN AMRO Mortgage Group Inc.)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... ABN AMRO Mortgage Group Inc., the nation's sixth largest mortgage lender announced that it has added 'one-click refinancing' to its Mortgage.com website. Ann Arbor, Mich.-based ABN AMRO Mortgage Group's one million-plus existing customers...

Despite Loss, CheckFree Hits Some Electronic Payment Milestones.(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... CheckFree, a provider of electronic payment software and services, announced that in June it distributed 500,000 e-bills, for a run-rate of six million bills per year. The company also reported revenue of $121.8 million for the quarter...

Spectrum Teams Up with 'edocs'.(Spectrum EBP)(Brief Article)
October 1, 2001... Spectrum EBP, a provider of electronic banking and payment services formed by a consortium of banks, has formed an alliance with edocs, based in Natick, Mass., to connect billers and consumers through Spectrum's electronic bill presentment and...

Servicing People.(personnel changes in mortgage servicing industry)
October 1, 2001... CALIFORNIA Los Angeles - Catherine K. Lam has been promoted to chief appraiser for statewide operations of the United California Bank, joining the ranks of only a limited number of female chief appraisers at large banking institutions...