National Mortgage News articles from October 2006

National Mortgage News archives from October 2006

Inside Track.
October 2, 2006... EDITORIAL Happy Birthday, NMN! 4 OPEN FORUM Good Luck, Sen. Sarbanes! 4 STREET SMARTS New Trading Range 5 TECHNOLOGY PCI Releases Data 6 INTERNATIONAL MORTGAGES UK Loan...

Subprime Volume 3rd Best.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Mortgage bankers funded $201 billion of subprime loans in the second quarter, the industry's third-best showing ever. According to exclusive survey figures compiled by National Mortgage News and the Quarterly Data Report,...

Subprime Residential Lending Volume.
October 2, 2006... ($ in Millions) Subprime Volume Percent Market Rk Organization Name Q2 '06 Q2 '05 Change Share 1 Wells Fargo Home Mortgage (1) $27,197 $8,725 212% ...

Fraud Reports Deluge FBI.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Mortgage fraud resulted in losses of $546 million during the first half and is on track to outpace last year, according to newly released government figures. Statistics compiled by the Federal Bureau of Investigation found...

Jackson 'Urged Vetting'.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Housing secretary Alphonso Jackson told key HUD officials and senior staff to monitor and consider the political affiliation of contract competitors, according to an investigation by the agency's Office of Inspector General. ...

E-W2 Would Aid Paperless Loans.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- A long contention in the mortgage industry has been that even if the industry adopts electronic processes, things like W2s will always be paper, but that is no longer the case. A new program by the Internal Revenue Service will...

Strong Interest In WaMu 'Euros'.
October 2, 2006... SEATTLE -- Washington Mutual Inc. here has settled its 4 billion euro (about $5.1 billion) sale of European-style covered bonds and indicated that buyer interest in the groundbreaking debt instruments was strong. "The demand we saw in this...

Mortgage 'Edutainment'.
October 2, 2006... Attracting Latino homebuyers into the marketplace has never been more creative. Leading such efforts, Freddie Mac has introduced the "telenovela" or the Spanish version of the American TV soap opera as a marketing tool. "Nuestro Barrio,"...

Regulators Ready Guidance on 'Exotic' Loans: The new guidance frowns on 'risk layering,' especially when a second lien is added to a high risk first mortgage.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Late last week, federal banking regulators were set to release their long-awaited guidance on nontraditional mortgages with analysts debating what impact - if any - it would have on the "exotic" market. Two Washington...

Home Equity Overdue Rate Falls.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- The percentage of home-equity loans and home-equity lines of credit that were overdue fell in the second quarter, despite an upturn in the composite consumer loan delinquency rate at commercial banks. According to the...

SouthStar Settles Discrimination Case: Restrictive lending on affordable row house properties sparked the allegations of racial bias.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- SouthStar Funding LLC has agreed to pay $500,000 in settling a complaint by a community development group that alleges its policies on funding row-house loans discriminate against blacks and Hispanics. The National Community...

Stewart Ensnared in CA Dispute.
October 2, 2006... SACRAMENTO, CA -- It was over one year ago that California insurance commissioner John Garamendi went after three of the nation's largest title insurers over their captive reinsurance arrangements. Now he is going after a fourth, Stewart...

Doral to Pay $25 Million Fine.
October 2, 2006... SAN JUAN, PR -- Doral Financial Corp., one of several Puerto Rican mortgage lenders that has been embroiled in accounting scandals, said it has reached an agreement with the SEC to resolve an investigation into the company relating to Doral's...

Editorial: A Good Age.(Editorial)
October 2, 2006... Thirty is a great age to be. While still young and vigorous, a person who is 30 has also accumulated enough wisdom to overcome the follies and rootlessness of youth. While some of us might think twice about wishing to be 21 again, I think...

Open Forum: Changes Perplex Borrowers.
October 2, 2006... Sen. Sarbanes, the Ranking Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, made the following remarks at the opening of a hearing on nontraditional mortgage products. While we focused on the overall housing market last week, today's hearing is...

Sizing Up a New Trading Range and Other Shifts in the Market.
October 2, 2006... The market's been going through some notable changes lately and there are probably more ahead. That's making it a little more challenging to define and draw up strategies for but also creating opportunities for some. Among the changes seen...

PCi Releases 2005 Peer Mortgage Data.
October 2, 2006... BOSTON -- Compliance technology provider PCi Corp., a Wolters Kluwer Financial Services company here, has released its Peer Mortgage Data based on the Federal Reserve Board's 2005 Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data. In the release, PCi...

Flagstar, Ellie Mae Embrace MISMO: 'With the Flagstar platform we are helping the industry push along the standard that everyone wants to embrace.'.
October 2, 2006... TROY, MI -- Bringing mortgage industry standards to actual fruition, Flagstar Bank here and Ellie Mae, Dublin, Calif., have completed a MISMO-compliant integration of Ellie Mae Encompass into Flagstar's Digital Document Transfer platform. ...

IndyMac Renews CEO's Contract.
October 2, 2006... PASADENA, CA -- IndyMac Bancorp Inc. here has signed its chairman and chief executive Michael W. Perry to a new five-year contract that is performance-based. His base salary remains at $1 million per year, but with incentives, he can earn...

Freddie Reaches Out to Soldiers.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Freddie Mac has opened its affordable mortgage program to give activity-duty soldiers and reservists more purchasing power when they buy a home. Under its Home Possible program, Freddie will purchase low- or zero-down loans...

MBS Pioneer Hopes to Create Market for Leads.
October 2, 2006... NEW YORK -- The Chicago Board of Trade has made a $1 million investment in ROOT Exchange, a marketplace where leads can be traded. Seth Goldstein, the founder of ROOT, said the fundamental thesis behind the exchange started with the...

Owners Upbeat About Housing.
October 2, 2006... NEW YORK -- Consumers still remain optimistic despite the pullback in the real estate market, according to the second annual RBC Capital Markets Consumer Survey. Nearly half of all homeowners still expect at least 5% annual increases in...

U.K. Loan Volume Hits Record.
October 2, 2006... LONDON -- Gross mortgage lending in the United Kingdom hit its 10th consecutive monthly record in August, reaching [pounds sterling]32.7 billion (about $62 billion), according to the latest data from the Council of Mortgage Lenders here. ...

Russia Building Secondary Market.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- The public securitization of mortgage certificates in Russia has been successfully completed - with some U.S. support, according to the U.S. government's Overseas Private Investment Corp. here. OPIC said it supported the deal...

French Market Remains Strong.
October 2, 2006... LOS ANGELES -- While the U.S. housing market has been what the chairman and chief executive of builder Kaufman & Broad here has called "challenging," the French affiliate the company holds a majority stake in operates in a market where "housing...

Fund Invests in Student Housing.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Years ago, college dormitories were practically tenements stuffed with strangers and their stuff. Today, they are commodious, well-appointed apartments with plenty of room for their occupants and their things. Student housing...

GEO Group Buys Prison REIT.
October 2, 2006... BOCA RATON, FL -- The GEO Group, a provider of correctional and mental health services, is acquiring Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.-based CentraCore Properties Trust, a correctional real estate investment trust, for about $396 million, including the...

Commercial Debt Nears $2.8 Trillion.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Commercial and multifamily mortgage debt outstanding hit a new high of $2.764 trillion in the second quarter, a 2.8% increase from the first quarter, the Mortgage Bankers Association reports. Multifamily mortgage debt...

Collateralized Debt Market Serves 'Transitional' Commercial RE.
October 2, 2006... NEW YORK -- There is now an entirely new demand for transitional properties, thanks to commercial real estate collateralized debt obligations, according to Bob Ricci, managing director, Wachovia Securities. Speaking at a panel session on...

Roundup: Two Deals Decline.
October 2, 2006... NEW YORK -- Two classes of Metropolitan Asset Funding Inc. II, series 1998-B, have been downgraded by Moody's Investors Service. Class B-1 was downgraded from B3 to Caa1, and class B-2 was downgraded from Ca to C. The downgrades were...

Morgan CMBS Classes Slip.
October 2, 2006... NEW YORK -- Three classes of Morgan Stanley Dean Witter Capital I Trust commercial mortgage pass-through certificates, series 2001-TOP3, have been downgraded by Moody's Investors Service. The downgrades were as follows: class J, from Ba3 to...

More HE Classes Downgraded.
October 2, 2006... NEW YORK -- Twenty mezzanine and subordinate certificates from 10 home-equity loan transactions issued by Structured Asset Securities Corp.'s Amortizing Residential Collateral Trusts in 2001 and 2002 have been downgraded by Moody's Investors...

WaMu Reveals Problem in Pay-Option Underwriting.
October 2, 2006... SEATTLE -- Washington Mutual failed to account for increasing interest rates when calculating debt-to-income ratios used in payment-option adjustable-rate mortgage underwriting during 2004 and 2005, the company said in its annual 10-K filing...

GDW a Burden For Wachovia?
October 2, 2006... NEW YORK -- Stock analysts at Merrill Lynch have downgraded Wachovia Corp. to a "neutral" rating, citing risks related to Wachovia's acquisition of adjustable-rate mortgage giant Golden West Financial. In a report, Merrill Lynch said that...

Early Warnings Seen at Lehman.
October 2, 2006... NEW YORK -- Lehman Brothers reported strong results in the company's most recent fiscal quarter, but analysts at CreditSights say the company's mortgage business is showing "signs of weakness." In a recent report, CreditSights said that...

New CEO Aims to Make VantageScore a Leader.
October 2, 2006... STAMFORD, CT -- VantageScore Solutions LLC here has named Barrett Burns as its president and chief executive. The company was formed by the three national credit repositories to house the intellectual property behind the VantageScore...

People.
October 2, 2006... CALIFORNIA Oakland-Greg DeMartini has been elected to the position of senior vice president, San Francisco County manager of Old Republic Title Co. As senior vice president and county manager, Mr. DeMartini will oversee the...

Genworth to Insure 40-Year IO Loans.
October 2, 2006... RALEIGH, NC -- Genworth Mortgage Insurance here has introduced a product it says will allow lenders to offer 40-year interest-only loans, which in turn will allow more consumers to purchase homes in high-priced housing markets. The product is...

MICA Ad Campaign Targets Brokers, Agents.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- The nation's mortgage insurers are launching a campaign to remind brokers and agents about the advantages of low-downpayment mortgages with private mortgage insurance for many first-time and move-up home buyers. The Mortgage...

Home Affordability Is Slipping in Pennsylvania: 'All of these situations point to a housing market that is settling down slowly and in an orderly way.'.
October 2, 2006... HARRISBURG, PA -- Pennsylvania's housing market remains relatively stable compared to other parts of the country but Keystone State homes are becoming less affordable, which signals a shift away from a "sellers' market," according to an...

Publicly Traded Subprime and Alt-A Related Firms.
October 2, 2006... B&C Stock Price Index: 205.8 Change: -0.7 Company 52 wk/lo 52 wk/hi 9/28/2006 Wkly. %Chg. P/E % Chg. From Ratio Aames (AIC) ...

AmNet Picks Up Wholesale Business.
October 2, 2006... CHARLOTTE, NC -- Wachovia Mortgage's wholesale business is being merged with American Mortgage Network, San Diego, with the combination being named Wachovia Securities Wholesale Mortgage. AmNet has been a part of Wachovia Securities, a unit...

OTS Reverses Its Course on CRA.
October 2, 2006... WASHINGTON -- The Office of Thrift Supervision went off the reservation two years ago and set up its own Community Reinvestment Act regime. But now the new chief is ready to move OTS back in line with the other federal banking regulators. ...

Mortgage Industry Equity Composite.
October 2, 2006... MIEC Index: 156.9 Change: 2.0 Company 9/21/2006 9/28/2006 Wkly. 52 52 % Chg. P/E % Chg. wk/lo wk/hi From Ratio Astoria Federal (AF) 31.39 31.12...

MA Regulator Warns Lenders.
October 2, 2006... PROVIDENCE, RI -- A Massachusetts banking regulator warned mortgage lenders at a conference here that they can be held liable for the actions of rogue originators in their organization. John Prendergast, chief risk officer for the...

Inside Track.
October 9, 2006... EDITORIAL Meet and Greet 4 OPEN FORUM Housing Feels a Chill 4 STREET SMARTS Homebuilding Woes 5 COMMERCIAL MORTGAGES Flagstar Expanding 10 AFFORDABLE HOUSING The DPA Industry at Large 16...

Housing 'Crash' Coming.
October 9, 2006... WASHINGTON -- The downturn in the housing market is in "full swing," according to Moody's Economy.com, with nearly 20 metropolitan areas set to "crash" over the next 24 months. In one of the most pessimistic forecasts by a major forecasting...

Profitability Fell in 2005.
October 9, 2006... WASHINGTON -- Profitability for residential mortgage bankers on a per-loan basis fell 61% in 2005 as origination costs increased by 38%, according to a new study by the Mortgage Bankers Association. The trade group did find one bright spot...

Pretax Income of the 'Average' MB.
October 9, 2006... The Average Total Residential Year Income Fundings (1) 2005 $26 million $2.911 trillion 2004 $23 million $2.742 trillion 2003 $61 million $3.812 trillion 2002 $40 million $2.854...

Citi Buys Irwin Servicing.
October 9, 2006... NEW YORK -- Citigroup has acquired a majority of Irwin Mortgage's $19 billion servicing portfolio, investment banking sources have told National Mortgage News. Citigroup bought about 60% of the receivables, with three other buyers...

Exotics Will Not Falter.
October 9, 2006... WASHINGTON -- If you think new regulatory guidance on "exotic" mortgages will damage the market, think again. "It's not going to scare anyone away," said Goldman Sachs vice president Rudy Orman. "It'll just create a new standard." Federal...

NAMB Lobbies HUD.
October 9, 2006... ATLANTIC CITY, NJ -- The National Association of Mortgage Brokers is lobbying the Department of Housing and Urban Development to relax its rules in regard to brokers and Federal Housing Administration-insured loans. The president-elect of...

Top Subprime Servicers at 6/30/06.
October 9, 2006... (Dollars in Millions) Total Servicing Vol. Percent Market Rk Organization Name Location 6/30/06 6/30/05 Change Share 1 Countrywide Financial Calabasas, CA...

E-Delivery Competitors Combine Forces in Deal.
October 9, 2006... CINCINNATI -- Mortgage technology vendor eLynx Ltd. here has acquired competitor SwiftView Inc. A purchase price was not disclosed. American Capital Strategies, eLynx's parent, will provide equity and debt financing for the transaction. ...

Chase Picks Fidelity's 'MSP' Product.
October 9, 2006... JACKSONVILLE, FL -- Chase Home Finance, Iselin, N.J., has selected the Fidelity National Information Services Inc. Mortgage Servicing Package to replace and upgrade multiple legacy software platforms for servicing its $600 billion portfolio....

Missouri Bank Suffers Charge.
October 9, 2006... MOUNTAIN GROVE, MO -- First Bancshares here, parent of First Home Savings Bank, has amended its second-quarter earnings to reflect impairment related to two equity securities, reducing the company's previously reported earnings by $260,260. ...

Freddie IO Purchases Double.
October 9, 2006... MCLEAN, VA -- Purchases of interest-only mortgages accounted for 14% of Freddie Mac's total purchase volume in the first half of this year, double the share of IO purchases in 2005. Freddie Mac executives said IO loans still only account...

Morgan Stanley Buys Chinese MB.
October 9, 2006... NEW YORK -- Morgan Stanley has acquired Chinese mortgage lender Nan Tung Bank, a subsidiary of the Bank of China, in a deal approved by Chinese regulators. No purchase price was disclosed. The bank was sold to the Wall Street firm by Nam...

FBR Shuts ABS Mortgage Unit.
October 9, 2006... ARLINGTON, VA -- Investment banker Friedman Billings Ramsey here has closed its mortgage-related asset-backed securities group. A spokeswoman for the company said mortgage ABS "is a small part of our overall business. It represents less than 2%...

Editorial: Meet and Greet.(Editorial)
October 9, 2006... With the coming of October the mortgage industry is well into its annual fall meeting season. Just as you can count on the leaves turning color this time of year, you can count on many, many mortgage banker and mortgage broker confabs being...

Open Forum: Housing Feels a Chill.
October 9, 2006... Mr. Lawler's recent testimony on the housing bubble and its implications for the economy before the Senate Banking Committee is presented as our Open Forum. The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight has a strong interest in...

Homebuilding Woes Counterbalancing Rates and Refi Comeback.
October 9, 2006... Although refinancing made somewhat of a comeback in the last week and as long-term rates and the long-term rate-indicative 10-year Treasury yield have remained relatively low, building concerns continue to offset their effects to some extent....

Fitch Warns On Condo, Land Loans for CDOs: The presence of nontraditional property types has more than doubled.
October 9, 2006... NEW YORK -- Fitch Ratings has sounded a warning about the appearance of condo and land loans in commercial real estate collateralized debt obligations. There is a higher level of default risk associated with these loans that investors...

Lenders Reaching Out for Diversity.
October 9, 2006... WASHINGTON -- In an effort to expand homeownership opportunities for all, some of the nation's largest lenders are reaching out to recruit more minorities into their organizations. Speaking at a recent diversity conference sponsored by his...

Freddie Estimates $2.7B In First-Half Income, But Loses Share.
October 9, 2006... MCLEAN, VA -- Freddie Mac earned an estimated $2.7 billion in the first half of this year, but those results were bolstered by mark-to-market gains in the value of guarantee fees and derivative instruments that could evaporate due to declining...

Ameriprise S&L Will Fund Loans: Ameriprise advisors will assess a customer's mortgage needs and make suggestions.
October 9, 2006... MINNEAPOLIS -- Ameriprise Financial Inc., a financial planning and services company here, has created its own thrift subsidiary, Ameriprise Bank FSB, New York. One of the bank's first moves will be to roll out residential mortgages,...

Sales Bottom Coming in Mid-07: NAHB chief economist David Seiders is forecasting new home sales will hit bottom in mid-2007 and stay below trend into 2008.
October 9, 2006... WASHINGTON -- The decline in home sales flattened out as summer came to end but many economists don't expect the market to bottom out until the middle of next year. The August sales data also provided the first signs of a price correction...

NetBank CEO Resigns; Servicing Sale.
October 9, 2006... COLUMBIA, SC -- NetBank Inc. here, a top-40-ranked mortgage lender, said its chairman and chief executive officer, Douglas Freeman, resigned last week. The resignation comes as the company finalizes a deal to sell a majority of its $15...

N.J. Regulator Urging 'Prudence'.
October 9, 2006... ATLANTIC CITY, NJ -- The commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Banking and Insurance is urging mortgage brokers to use "prudence" when recommending certain loan products to their clients. Steven M. Goldman told attendees at the New...

10-K Deadline Extended For PHH Corp.
October 9, 2006... MOUNT LAUREL, NJ -- The New York Stock Exchange has extended the deadline for PHH Corp. here to file its annual report, commonly referred to as Form 10-K, for the year of 2005. In a statement, PHH said the extension allows for the continued...

Multifamily Transactions.
October 9, 2006... * America First Apartment Investors is acquiring a four-property North Carolina portfolio of 1,052 units for about $62 million. * Venture West Funding has arranged a $27.3 million loan backed by 16 Los Angeles-area buildings, with 570...

Flagstar Expands CRE Lending: 'We've developed an expertise in commercial real estate lending in the states where we have a banking presence.'.
October 9, 2006... TROY, MI -- Flagstar Bank is expanding its commercial real estate lending operations to 16 additional states, mostly in the West, Midwest and South. Flagstar expects to offer different forms of commercial real estate financing, including...

Kite Enters JV With Prudential.
October 9, 2006... INDIANAPOLIS -- Kite Realty Group, a retail real estate investment trust, has entered into a joint venture with Prudential Real Estate Investors to invest up to $1.25 billion in U.S. retail properties. The venture is interested in...

Analyst: Democratic Gains in Election Could Boost GSE Stocks.
October 9, 2006... ALEXANDRIA, VA -- Republicans may traditionally get more votes among business leaders than Democrats, but investors in the stock of government-sponsored enterprises may be rooting for the Democrats this time. That's because at least some...

Data Show More Signs of Cooling.
October 9, 2006... ALEXANDRIA, VA -- Housing data released in mid-September continue to suggest that housing markets are cooling, but at the same time a dip in interest rates helped generate additional mortgage refinancing activity. For the week ending Sept....

Some See Continuing Need for Downpayment Help: 'If you are a lender you go in, you sign up with the program, we teach you about it.'.
October 9, 2006... DALLAS -- Even though some mortgage providers see the downpayment assistance industry as a thing of the past, others say demand indicates that DPA products designed to assist low- to moderate-income homebuyers will continue to be an...

AmeriDream to Develop Homes in D.C.
October 9, 2006... GAITHERSBURG, MD -- The District of Columbia has awarded $8 million to AmeriDream Inc. to start the development of a $30 million affordable housing project in Southeast D.C. that will be built using a combination of resources, services and...

People.
October 9, 2006... CALIFORNIA Alamo-Residential Pacific Mortgage has hired Darlene Espinoza, Monica Espinoza and Lynn Eskew, all leaving from CMG Mortgage to join RPM's Danville office. Darlene Espinoza, who brings almost a decade of experience in the...

Experian Buys Canadian Unit.
October 9, 2006... COSTA MESA, CA -- Experian has expanded its Canadian operations by acquiring Quebec-based Northern Credit Bureaus Inc. This extends the number of countries in which Experian operates consumer credit bureaus to 13. The California-based...

First Data Spins Off Western Union.
October 9, 2006... ENGLEWOOD, CO -- Western Union, the money transfer giant, has completed its spin-off from First Data Corp. and began trading on the New York Stock Exchange earlier this month. The newly independent company is a member of the S&P 500....

Metavante Absorbs GHR: Metavante sees its biggest competitors as Fidelity and Fiserv.
October 9, 2006... WAYNE, PA -- Metavante Corp., the banking and payments technology subsidiary of Marshall & Ilsley Corp., has absorbed GHR Systems under its Metavante Lending Solutions suite of products and services. The newly formed product suite will...

Homecomings Hopes to go Paperless.
October 9, 2006... MINNEAPOLIS -- Homecomings Financial has taken steps to adopt paperless processing and push that savings down to mortgage brokers it does business with by adopting the Advectis BlitzDocs collaborative network. Through this process mortgage...

Partnership Allows For Secure Doc Exchange.
October 9, 2006... MINNEAPOLIS -- Wolters Kluwer Financial Services and Mortgage Cadence have aligned to offer joint clients secure document exchange. Wolters Kluwer's SDX application gives lenders a way to securely transfer important private data and...

Mortgage Industry Equity Composite.
October 9, 2006... MIEC Index: 159.0 Change: 2.1 Company 9/28/2006 10/5/2006 Wkly. 52 52 % Chg. P/E % Chg. wk/lo wk/hi From Ratio Astoria Federal (AF) 31.12 ...