MDA DataQuick announced Tuesday that it has entered into a multi-year agreement with Digital Map Products (DMP) to combine DMP's geospatial mapping technology with MDA DataQuick's real estate data. According to John Walsh, president of MDA DataQuick, this partnership will empower real estate professionals by helping them better visualize data and market analysis, and ultimately reduce risk.

Further expanding its existing range of default management services, the business outsourcing firm Zenta announced Wednesday that it has successfully implemented an end-to-end short sale program that is fully compliant with the administration's Home Affordable Foreclosure Alternatives (HAFA) program. According to the company, this workflow-based process management system is customized to adhere to the latest HAFA guidelines and timetables.

Despite a surge in refinance applications, total mortgage loan application volume fell 1.5 percent for the week ending May 14, 2010, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) reported Wednesday. MBA attributed the fall-off to a drastic plunge in purchase applications, which tumbled 27.1 percent from one week earlier, marking the lowest level observed in the survey since May of 1997. MBA's refinance index, on the other hand, jumped 14.5 percent.

Rudy Orman has left his post as VP of New York-based Marathon Asset Management LLC to join Residential Credit Solutions (RCS), a mortgage investment and servicing company based in Ft. Worth, Texas. Orman comes to RCS as director and SVP of business development and marketing, responsible for anything producing business for the company.

In the first quarter of 2010, commercial and multifamily mortgage loan originations were 12 percent higher than the same period last year but 26 percent lower than the fourth quarter of 2009, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) reported Tuesday. New origination volumes varied considerably by investor group. MBA found that loans through securities conduits were up 657 percent from a year ago, while originations for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which remained robust through the credit crisis, fell by almost half.

As of April 30, Wells Fargo had completed 36,094 permanent modifications under the administration's Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP). According to Treasury, Wells Fargo ranks third for the number of permanent modifications completed to date, trailing behind Bank of America, with 56,398 permanent modifications, and JP Morgan Chase, with 39,507.

Reports on the San Francisco Bay Area housing market were mixed in April. New industry data shows that the median price for single-family homes in the Bay Area jumped 5.5 percent from March to April, but during the same period, sales volume fell 3.7 percent.

While it's undeniable that the financial crisis and recession were triggered by the bursting of the housing bubble and the subprime mortgage crisis that began in late 2006 to early 2007, a working paper recently released by the research department of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia suggests that reform to personal bankruptcy law also played an important role. Overall, the researchers calculated that bankruptcy reform caused the number of mortgage defaults to increase by around 200,000 per year even before the start of the financial crisis.

As homeowners continue to default on their mortgage loans, banks are desperate to determine the pre-default triggers that are causing this phenomenon. A new service offered by Atlanta-based VueLogic will give banks the opportunity to do just that and much more. Starting in June 2010, the company is bringing its loan level statistical scoring techniques to the default space to help banks determine the customer behaviors that trigger defaults.

The law firm of Thompson & Knight LLP recently announced the addition of Mark Weibel as a partner in the firm's Dallas office. Weibel joins the firm with his experienced team of four associates, including Bryan L. Larson, Bryan D. Garner, Christopher W. Neilson, and Shannon Fey Stapp. Together, Weibel and his team will combine with Thompson & Knight's existing real estate, banking, and financing expertise to establish a capital markets practice group.