Wed, Jun 17 2020, 4:36 PM
There has apparently been considerable confusion regarding servicer obligations to report to credit agencies regarding loans in forbearance. The origi...
Wed, Jun 17 2020, 10:49 AM
Residential construction numbers climbed in May after their pandemic-driven collapse in April. The Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urb...
Wed, Jun 17 2020, 8:13 AM
Mortgage Application volumes continued to grow during the week ended June 12 as mortgage rates reached new lows and states allowed more businesses to ...
Tue, Jun 16 2020, 11:11 AM
The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) released its annual Report to Congress for 2019 on Monday. The report summarizes the FHFA's activities as re...
Tue, Jun 16 2020, 10:45 AM
The COVID-19 outbreak struck a major blow to builder confidence in April. The prospect of widespread shutdowns of businesses and prolonged shelter at ...
Mon, Jun 15 2020, 9:49 AM
The continued high volume of refinancing kept mortgage lenders' outlook for profits relatively high during the second quarter, although it was down sl...
Fri, Jun 12 2020, 12:12 PM
Home flipping, defined as buying a home and reselling it (in two arms-length transactions) within a year, accounted for 7.5 percent of all home sales ...
Fri, Jun 12 2020, 11:30 AM
The number of homeowners with mortgages in forbearance has fallen for the second consecutive week. Black Knight reports that, as of June 9, there were...
Thu, Jun 11 2020, 11:56 AM
Home equity reports have not been particularly interesting over the last few years. Home prices kept rising, owners kept whittling down their loan-to-...
Wed, Jun 10 2020, 10:10 AM
Lenders, responding to increasing unemployment rates and other risks, tightened lending standards in May, sending the Mortgage Bankers Association's (...
Wed, Jun 10 2020, 10:09 AM
The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) says that mortgage application volume rose significantly during the week ended June 5 as many states began to l...
Tue, Jun 9 2020, 11:47 AM
After falling an aggregate of 29.5 points in March and April, Fannie Mae says its Home Purchase Sentiment Index (HPSI) has begun to recover. The Index...
Tue, Jun 9 2020, 9:38 AM
The strength of the housing industry at the end of 2019 and beginning of 2020 served, to a certain extent, as a buffer as the COVID-19 pandemic began ...
Mon, Jun 8 2020, 9:41 AM
Black Knight says that only three months after the national delinquency rate hit a record low, falling 1.5 percentage point below its pre-Great Recess...
Fri, Jun 5 2020, 2:47 PM
A joint release from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) and the Conference of State Bank Supervisors cautions mortgage servicers about th...
Fri, Jun 5 2020, 11:28 AM
The number of mortgages in forbearance plans declined this past week for the first time since the CARES Act to address the COVID-19 pandemic was enact...
Thu, Jun 4 2020, 2:24 PM
The Urban Institute says that homes categorized as low priced, that is in the bottom 20 percent of the distribution, appreciated 126 percent between t...
Wed, Jun 3 2020, 10:03 AM
Refinancing volume continued to slide but purchase mortgage activity partially compensated during the holiday shortened week that ended May 29. The Mo...
Tue, Jun 2 2020, 11:12 AM
CoreLogic's report on April home prices, the first for that month, says that despite fears that home prices would "bottom out like they did in the Gre...
Tue, Jun 2 2020, 8:21 AM
Overall spending on construction fell in April, down 2.9 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1.346 trillion from 1.387 trillion. This sti...
Mon, Jun 1 2020, 12:15 PM
As was reported last week, new home sales in April were much, much better than expected. There may or may not be a cause and effect going on here, but...
Mon, Jun 1 2020, 11:26 AM
The Urban Institute (UI) releases a regular report, Housing Finance at a Glance , a "chartbook" loaded with charts and commentary on mortgage activity...
Fri, May 29 2020, 9:14 AM
Black Knight says its research is showing that the numbers of new forbearance plans for homeowners financially affected by the COVID-19 pandemic have ...
Thu, May 28 2020, 10:46 AM
Pending home sales cratered again in April, marking two straight months of declines that exceeded 20 percent. The National Association of Realtors® (N...
Wed, May 27 2020, 10:58 AM
Freddie Mac reported this week that its total mortgage portfolio increased at an annualized rate of 14.3 percent in April, up from a 9.2 percent gain ...
Wed, May 27 2020, 9:50 AM
Purchase mortgage applications rose for the 6 th straight week, driving the Mortgage Bankers Association's Market Composite Index back into positive t...
Tue, May 26 2020, 11:37 AM
New home sales, rather than dropping like a rock, rose 0.6 percent in April according to the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urba...
Tue, May 26 2020, 11:11 AM
Even as the COVID-19 pandemic began to hobble home sales in many locations, home prices continued to increase. the Federal Housing Finance Agency's (F...
Fri, May 22 2020, 12:34 PM
The years-long downward trend of mortgage delinquencies appears to have come to an abrupt end in April. Black Knight, in its "first look" at the month...
Fri, May 22 2020, 9:54 AM
The number of homeowners in mortgage forbearance plans continues to increase, reaching 4.75 million by May 19. This is 9.0 percent of all active borro...
Thu, May 21 2020, 11:57 AM
Existing home sales fell hard in April, the numbers coming in about where analysts expected them but breaking a nine-month string of annual gains. The...
Thu, May 21 2020, 10:16 AM
Interest rates on closed loans continued to decline in April, falling from 3.65 percent in March to 3.48 percent according to the Origination Insight ...
Thu, May 21 2020, 10:13 AM
Maybe all of the talk about ending the GSE's long term incarceration in conservatorship is more than talk this time. Earlier this week both Freddie Ma...
Thu, Mar 26 2020, 12:50 PM
Flexibility seems to be the keyword as government agencies try to adjust to a lot of new realities. The Federal Housing Finance agency has already emp...
Wed, May 20 2020, 11:10 AM
With the number of homeowners under forbearance plans nearing 10 percent of all of those having a mortgage, a Lending Tree survey indicates that most ...
Wed, May 20 2020, 8:25 AM
Purchase mortgage applications extended their recent run of gains through the week ended May 15. The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) said its Purch...
Tue, May 19 2020, 1:43 PM
Homeowners who have been granted forbearance from making full payments on their GSE guaranteed loans during the COVID-19 crisis may still be able to r...
Tue, May 19 2020, 10:16 AM
The April residential construction numbers are, of course, horrible. But they aren't out of line with expectations, and builders did continue to plan ...
Tue, May 19 2020, 8:35 AM
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (the GSEs) have taken what each is calling an important step toward ending their 12 years of operating under conservatorshi...
Mon, May 18 2020, 4:43 PM
IBuyers, that new label for real estate agencies that buy homes from sellers rather than just listing them, are back in the hunt. Redfin announced lat...
Mon, May 18 2020, 10:39 AM
Nearly all financial indicators took a hit last month as unemployment measures shot higher, businesses shut down, and consumers and their families sel...
Fri, May 15 2020, 11:42 AM
Fannie Mae's Economic and Strategic Research (ESR) group says it expects the U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) to decline by 35 percent (annualized) i...
Fri, May 15 2020, 10:42 AM
The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) says applications for financing new home purchases were down 25 percent in April compared to March and by 12 pe...
Fri, May 15 2020, 9:10 AM
In its May 5 report on the number of COVID-19 forbearance plans in effect, Black Knight said the rate of new plans had slowed , but speculated they co...
Thu, May 14 2020, 11:10 AM
The national delinquency rate rose significantly in the first quarter of 2020, driven largely by a surge in the early stage rates. The Mortgage Banker...
Thu, May 14 2020, 8:18 AM
The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) and both GSEs (Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac) have announced a new option for homeowners in COVID-19 forbearanc...
Wed, May 13 2020, 8:23 AM
Last week was yet another good one for purchase mortgage activity and refinancing, while continuing to fade, was still at double its pace of a year ag...
Tue, May 12 2020, 12:23 PM
Home prices really ramped up in the first quarter of 2020 as inventory failed to make significant gains. The National Association of Realtors® (NAR) s...
Tue, May 12 2020, 9:04 AM
CoreLogic's Loan Performance Insights Report has shown only incremental changes, primarily declines, in most of its measures of delinquency. The most ...
Mon, May 11 2020, 10:07 AM
The economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic are increasingly clear, and so are the results of some efforts to alleviate financial hardships. Gi...
