Real estate technology company Doma Holdings, Inc. partnered with digital payment software-as-a-service platform paymints.io, the company announced last week. Title and closing firms use paymints.io to allow homebuyers deposit their earnest money digitally and directly from their checking account. The aim of the partnership is to reduce the risk of wire fraud by adding paymints.io […]
Here’s the housing market rundown for the last week: Purchase application data had a solid week-to-week gain of 25%. That’s a big jump, but context is critical. Housing inventory decreased by 566 units, which is not a significant decline. Mortgage rates fell, but the bond market didn’t break what I see as a critical level, […]
On Friday NAR reported that total housing inventory levels broke under 1 million in December, dropping to 970,00 units for a population of 330 million people. And existing home sales crashed in 2022 from a peak of around 6.5 million in January down to about 4 million in December, We now have total inventory levels […]
Blank-check firm Aurora Acquisition Corp. wants to extend the deadline for completing its merger deal with struggling digital mortgage lender Better.com by six months for the third time, further dimming the prospects for the deal to go through. Novator Capital-sponsored Aurora shareholders will vote on an undisclosed date to extend the deadline by which the […]
The HousingWire award spotlight series highlights the individuals and organizations that have been recognized through our Editors’ Choice Awards. Nominations for HousingWire’s 2023 HW Finance Leaders are open now through Friday, January 27, 2023. Click here to nominate your organization. When it comes to the challenges faced by C-suite executives in housing, no one has had to bear the […]
Homebuilder confidence and demand for mortgages have increased recently, keeping hopes high for an improved housing market in 2023. But a modest recession is still expected this year, and elevated mortgage rates, coupled with high home prices, will limit housing activity, according to Fannie Mae. Fannie Mae expects total home sales in 2023 to be […]
The phrase “in like a lion, out like a lamb” is typically used to describe the month of March, but it is also applicable to existing home sales trends in 2022. After posting a 6.5% month-over-month increase in January, existing home sales trended downward throughout the rest of the year. In December, the seasonally adjusted […]
The Census Bureau‘s housing starts report for December shows that housing completions are still too slow, and we are running out of time this year as housing permits are set to fall until the homebuilders get rid of their excess supply. We had some good news this week for the housing market: purchase application data […]
Nonbank California lender loanDepot will start moving some of its backend operations to Black Knight‘s cloud-based version of the Empower loan origination system this year as the firm continues its efforts to cut costs. Black Knight’s loan origination system will complement and integrate with loanDepot’s proprietary technology system, mello, which rolled out in 2017, Black […]
Declining mortgage rates spurred the demand for home loans at the beginning of 2023, spreading optimism across the industry. But that’s not the only reason for the uptick. After months of a slowing housing market, sellers are offering more discounts to close deals and mortgage lenders are launching programs to protect their clients’ rates. “The […]
When industry veteran Michael Strauss abruptly shut down Long Island-based Sprout Mortgage in early July, there was uproar. Shocked employees didn’t receive their last paychecks. There were no severance packages, and even health insurance was canceled retroactive to May 2022, leaving some on the hook for huge medical bills. The lawsuits quickly came pouring in, […]
Tennessee-based mortgage lender Guaranty Home Mortgage Corporation hired Andy Voyles as executive vice president and director of retail lending. The mortgage lender hopes to boost volume in the channel. Voyles will be responsible for growing the retail division overseeing sales, operations and marketing as well as building on the existing framework, the company said Wednesday. […]
As the housing market slowed from its frenzied peak in 2022 due to soaring mortgage rates, homebuilders pulled back. An estimated of 1.533 million housing units were started in 2022, down 3.0% compared to 2021, according to a report released Thursday by U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Homebuilders closed out 2022 […]
Coldwell Banker franchise affiliate Coldwell Banker Real Estate Group acquired California lender Point Mortgage, the firms announced on Wednesday. Founded by Peter Mendiola and Johnny Margarini in 2000, Point Mortgage sponsors 126 MLOs and is licensed in 30 states with 27 branches across the country, according to the NMLS. “This new association brings our company […]
Builders feel more confident in the market, housing inventory data is positive and buyer demand for mortgages has increased — but don’t be fooled. The brutal low origination volume and industry consolidation that occurred for lenders in 2022 isn’t expected to turn around, at least not drastically, in 2023, according to Fitch Ratings. “Our outlook […]
Columbus, Ohio-headquartered lender Lower rolled out mortgage as a service platform that enables consumer finance, banking and real estate companies to offer its mortgage products. Lower’s platform is aimed to offer a “digital-first home financing experience quickly and easily” with white-label options available that can be embedded into the partner’s process through application programming interface […]
Like its competitors, Tennessee-based First Community Mortgage, Inc. (FCM) reduced the company’s size through 2022 amid a tough mortgage market. At the start of 2023, the company is investing in training the sales team on tactics to start growing the business again. Surprisingly, the landscape is helping. “There is certainly optimism in the air as mortgage applications have started […]
Pennymac, the country’s largest correspondent lender with about 14% market share, has its eyes fixed on absorbing origination volume that Wells Fargo is leaving behind in the correspondent channel. The California-based lender plans to increase its client base in the bank and credit union segment where Wells Fargo was most active, Abbie Tidmore, senior managing […]
The mortgage servicing rights (MSR) market has opened 2023 with a healthy volume of capital committed to purchasing the assets along with multiple sellers primed for deals — as evidenced by the $60 billion to $65 billion in MSR portfolio offerings currently out for bid, market experts say. That good news, however, is being overshadowed […]
Chantilly, Virginia-headquartered mortgage bank Prosperity Home Mortgage saw mortgage origination volume plummet by 40% last year — at a time when mortgage rates had more than doubled, home prices remained elevated and the market suffered from a shortage of inventory. Prosperity, a full-service mortgage banker operating in 49 jurisdictions in the U.S., plans to invest […]
San Diego, California-based startup Splitero, which is focused on home equity investments (HEI), has raised about $12 million in a Series A funding round to expand its operations. Fiat Ventures led the investment round of $11.7 million, the parties announced Tuesday. Gemini Ventures, Joint Effects, PBJ Capital, Permit Ventures, Dream Ventures, Goodwater Capital, Spark Growth Ventures, and Oyster Fund participated in the investment round. According to […]
The latest numbers have many in the industry starting the year on a hopeful note, with the possibility that we’ll see mortgage rates returning to the 5% range in 2023. “The 5% market’s a healthy market,” said Anna Ruotolo, branch manager and senior loan officer at Synergy One Lending. “A 5% market will be good. […]
Today we have some good news for the housing market! The weekly inventory data, which had fallen faster than I had anticipated the last few weeks, has now seen a slight uptick. With mortgage rates also falling, I am hopeful that more people will list their homes and buy another, so we can get back […]
“Dominate The One’s” was born out my appreciation for a tactic that was taught to me some 32 years ago and my frustration with how we in sales try to overcomplicate the simplest tasks in business. The year was 1990. And in my sixth-grade English class, I learned one of the most important business lessons […]
Like its nonbank competitors, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America operated in a highly challenging mortgage market in 2022. But quarterly earnings released on Friday also revealed that the top depository lenders struggled more than the overall mortgage market in the final three months of the year, perhaps an omen of what’s to […]
Going from a volatile rate environment in the latter half of 2022 to a market with lower, more stabilized rates, there’s optimism spreading across the industry that buyers will come back. Just two weeks into 2023, Guaranteed Rate‘s top LO and managing director Ben Cohen has also seen an increase in inbound calls from buyers […]
Wisconsin-based mortgage lender Waterstone Mortgage Corp. promoted Rico Garcia to vice president of enterprise risk from director of quality control, portfolio risk management and vendor management. In his new role, Garcia will supervise the quality control, title services, portfolio risk management and compliance teams at the company. In addition, he will work with other teams […]
The nation’s single-family investment-property sector and the lenders serving those borrowers face some major challenges in 2023 as rent growth is slipping, vacancy rates growing, home-value growth faltering, and a possible recession looms. For the non-QM lenders serving the single-family investment-property space who have managed interest-rates well to stay ahead of the market, however, there’s […]
Los Angeles-headquartered City National Bank agreed to pay $31 million in relief to impacted individuals and communities to settle a redlining case with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), the parties announced Thursday. City National was accused of the illegal practice of avoiding the provision of mortgage services to majority-Black and Hispanic neighborhoods. In this […]
Today’s inflation data has shown that the peak growth rate of inflation is behind us. This should also mean mortgage rates hit their highs. The key phrase I have stressed since I wrote about the case for mortgage rates to go lower on Oct. 27 is thinking 12 months out. The trend is your friend, […]
Mortgage industry watchers have started 2023 with optimism regarding the possibility of mortgage rates returning to the 5% range this year – but not without a dose of volatility on the way. “The mortgage market began 2023 on a positive note, with a decline in mortgage rates leading to an uptick in refinance applications. Purchase […]
Black Knight recently launched a web portal that enables clients, third-party providers and their developers to access the company’s application programming interfaces (APIs) across the mortgage life cycle. Dubbed the Developer Portal, clients can use Black Knight’s APIs to rapidly embed additional functionality within their applications, the company said in an announcement about the rollout. […]
Chantilly, Virginia-headquartered mortgage bank Prosperity Home Mortgage, a subsidiary of HomeServices of America, promoted Justin Messer to president and CEO on January 1, 2023. Messer succeeds Tim Wilson, who has been in the position since 2014. Messer, who was the Prosperity COO for more than three years, will be responsible for leading the lender to […]
Michigan-based United Wholesale Mortgage (UWM) is taking another step to aggressively reduce its prices in order to gain market share in a shrinking mortgage market. The company announced on Wednesday that it is giving up to 125 basis points to brokers to use on any loans they lock with the lender, with a maximum of 40 basis […]
Nashville, Tennessee-headquartered Defy Mortgage is the latest player to join the non-QM (non-qualified mortgage) lending space, which targets entrepreneurs and gig workers who have various forms of collateral, including cryptocurrency. The company takes a “holistic approach” to evaluating a homebuyer’s entire asset portfolio, including cryptocurrency and bitcoin, Defy Mortgage said Tuesday in an announcement about […]
Loan officers saw an increase in mortgage demand during the first week of 2023 as mortgage rates ticked down. And to close deals, sellers are increasingly coming to the table with concessions and rate buydowns. “I’ve had five people contact me in the last week or so to talk about buying a new home, which […]
American Pacific Mortgage (APM) has scooped up roughly 150 employees from 20 AmeriFirst Financial Inc. branches since December 2022, APM confirmed. APM learned the Arizona-based lender’s branches were ceasing originations last month, which led to an opportunity to recruit branch managers, loan originators and processors to make up for the lost production this year, APM’s […]
Well, here we are at the beginning of another year. For those of us in housing finance, the calendar year change really does mean something. There is a mix of hope and uncertainty as we anticipate the potential increase of post-holiday volume and the proven run up to the spring and summer buying season. However, […]
Wells Fargo, the largest depository mortgage lender in America, announced Tuesday that it is officially exiting the correspondent channel as well as reducing its servicing portfolio, the country’s largest. The market already expected the move. Bloomberg reported in August that Wells Fargo would likely shrink or eliminate the correspondent channel, with bank executives expressing concern about […]
A new Redfin report found a record 41.9% of home sellers gave concessions to homebuyers in Q4 of 2022, through money for repairs and mortgage-rate buydowns. This represents the highest increase of any three-month period since July 2020 when Redfin started tracking this data. In Q3 of 2022 and Q4 of 2021, sellers gave concessions […]
Potential homebuyers’ purchase sentiment improved slightly in December, but that still remains well below pre-pandemic highs, according to new data from Fannie Mae. Ongoing affordability challenges are expected to limit buyers from entering the market in 2023, according to Fannie Mae, which will result in continued decline in home sales in coming months. But despite […]
Kansas City, Missouri-based North American Savings Bank (NASB) will shut down its consumer direct mortgage division and lay off employees, business partners and former employees told HousingWire. The changes will be effective on March 7. The mortgage lender announced the decision to employees on Friday, citing market conditions. Shortly after, employees, including closers, processors and […]
Rocket Pro TPO, a wholesale arm of Rocket Mortgage, will be providing credit reports at no cost for brokers when closing loans through the Detroit lender. The strategy is expected to court more brokers in an industry facing higher credit report fees. Rocket Pro TPO’s executive vice president Mike Fawaz said in an interview with […]
The housing market saw inventory fall 4% last week from the week before. That’s a big one-week change. Does that mean we are heading back to all-time lows in inventory again for 2023? Traditionally, we do see housing inventory fall in the month of December, however, we clearly saw in the second half of 2022 […]
One slice of the single-family home market that has gained traction over the past year in a topsy-turvy housing landscape is the build-for-rent sector — or BFR. Construction starts in the BFR market are being propelled by the ongoing demand for single-family rental units as high mortgage rates and limited for-sale inventory push home-purchase prospects […]