Boston-based Real Estate Fiduciary Services (REFS), a real estate investment strategist company, has announced the formation of a specialized Asset Management Alliance. Led by REFS President John Baczewski and comprised of seven other senior-level real estate practitioners from diverse backgrounds and cities, the alliance was created in response to the growing number of real estate investors, lenders, and owners with financially distressed and underperforming assets.

Miami Heat basketball star Dwyane Wade and retired Heat center Alonzo Mourning harnessed their celebrity influence Thursday to raise awareness of the foreclosure crisis in Miami and the affordable, certified resources available to struggling homeowners.

More than 300 attendees gathered at the InterContinental New Orleans June 3-5 to participate in the Loan Management & Servicing Seminar presented by USFN—America’s Mortgage Banking Attorneys.

The default servicing law firm of Millsap & Singer, LLC has expanded its Kansas City office, serving Western Missouri and Kansas, to a new location in Leawood, Kansas. The Leawood, Kansas location increases Millsap & Singer’s presence and the office space the firm has in the Kansas City metropolitan area.

The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) issued its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey on Wednesday, which showed the applications for home loans – both new purchases and refinances – rose last week.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac modified nearly 37,000 home loans during the first quarter of 2009, according to the GSEs’ regulator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA). The Q1 figure represents a 57 percent increase over the fourth quarter of 2008 and more than double the number of modifications made in the first quarter of last year.

Taylor Bean & Whitaker Mortgage Corp. (TBW), a wholesale lender based in Ocala, Florida, has agreed to pay 13 states and the District of Columbia $9 million in fines after regulators took a closer look at the company’s nontraditional mortgage loans made in 2006.

Mortgage rates shifted only slightly this week amid mixed reports on the state of the housing market, according to the Primary Mortgage Market Survey (PMMS) issued by Freddie Mac on Thursday. Frank Nothaft, Freddie Mac’s VP and chief economist, pointed to numbers released by the National Association of Realtors earlier this week, which showed that sales of existing homes have risen for two consecutive months.

The National Association of Realtors’ (NAR’s) chief economist, Lawrence Yun, publicly stated earlier this week that poor appraisals are stalling home sales. In announcing NAR’s numbers for home resales in May, Yun said, Pending home sales indicated much stronger activity, but some contracts are falling through from faulty valuations that keep buyers from getting a loan.

Pleasanton, California’s SmartZip, Inc. has announced the public beta launch of its Web site, SmartZip.com, and the introduction of SmartZip Score, analytics-based investment ratings for residential properties, including foreclosures.