Loss Mitigation

CoreLogic announced this week that the company's Credco division has launched a data-enhanced version of its ENCORE report, which the company says provides lenders with a 360-degree view of mortgage lending and servicing risk. In a recent test of more than 1 million loans, it identified 70 percent of the lender-identified fraud and more than 50 percent of the total foreclosure and charge-off losses.

The U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation Tuesday evening to end the administration's flagship foreclosure prevention initiative, the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP). The HAMP Termination Act (H.R. 839) was approved with a 252 to 170 vote. Pundits are calling it a largely symbolic vote since the bill is not expected to win as much favor in the Senate, although Republican senators have already introduced their own bill to pull the plug on the federal mod program.

Perhaps in preparation for the meeting between bank representatives and lawmakers scheduled for Wednesday, servicers have drafted their own proposal in response to the robo-signing settlement they were given earlier this month. Though specific details of the servicers' version are not yet available, the draft reportedly features some of the same guidelines as the 27-page term sheet sent by state attorneys general and federal regulators, although servicers made no mention of principal write-downs.

Blueberry Systems, LLC, a provider of mortgage production solutions to the financial services industry, recently enhanced its proprietary Conductor technology, a component of the company's flagship loan production platform, RELAY. The firms says the update gives mortgage lenders greater control over their loan data, which lowers the risk of errors and costly loan repurchases from mortgage investors.

Wolters Kluwer Financial Services on Tuesday announced the launch of Pre-Foreclosure Manager, a hosted solution for U.S. mortgage servicers to create, mail, track, and manage borrower default notices. The nation's servicers face a rising number of loans entering default in addition to increasing regulatory pressures. Wolters Kluwer Financial Services says its new technology offers a solution to address large spikes in foreclosure volumes with limited in-house resources and reduce the risk of non-compliance.

Halo Companies, Inc. announced Tuesday that famed football star, Heisman trophy winner, and two-time nominee to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, Tim Brown has joined the Halo Companies advisory board. Halo is a publicly-traded nationwide asset management and consumer financial services company that provides solutions to financially distressed consumers which can be applied individually or utilized as a comprehensive workout strategy.

Texas-based special servicer Wingspan Portfolio Advisors recently upgraded its technology with the release of Investor Portal 2.0. The improved Web-based portal provides stakeholders with access to their serviced loans through customizable dashboards. Wingspan SVP E.J. Kite calls the new portal a ""controlled yet flexible tool with a results-oriented approach that brings an entirely new dimension to special servicing.""

AMS Servicing LLC, a national specialty servicer for residential and small balance commercial mortgages, recently selected the TrackPoint default servicing platform to facilitate short sale transactions on behalf of its clients. AMS Servicing uses TrackPoint Short Sale with its short sale underwriting process to create customized, end-to-end short sale processes that work with the systems of individual servicers.

New data released by Lender Processing Services (LPS) Monday clearly illustrates that foreclosure timelines are growing longer and longer. The company reports that the average loan in foreclosure right now has been delinquent for a record 537 days, and 30 percent of loans in foreclosure have not made a payment in over two years. As of the end of February, LPS says foreclosure inventory levels stood at more than 30 times monthly foreclosure sales volume.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) has issued a notice to the chief executives of all the lenders it regulates warning them of the risks involved in real estate-owned exchange programs. Several companies have started marketing real estate-owned exchange programs to national banks as a means to reduce problem assets on their balance sheets, but the OCC says these programs ""can raise significant safety and soundness, legal, and accounting concerns.""