Inventory and price continued to rise for the month of April suggesting a healthier national housing market, according to the National Housing Trend Report released by Realtor.com. The group cited trends from the previous year which found "dramatic shortages" being replaced in 2014 by moderate home price gains in tandem with increasing inventories.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) released its latest Refinance Report, looking at data from the first quarter of 2014. The government agency reported that in Q1 2014, approximately 77,000 refinances were completed through the Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP), bringing the total refinances through HARP to 3.1 million since the program's inception.

Informative Research, a mortgage information services provider, announced that it has successfully completed the Experian Independent Third Party Assessment (EI3PA) certification. The technical and operational assessments are designed to help protect consumer information and enhance consumer compliance.

Despite claims that the recent rise in housing prices is solving the nation’s foreclosure and economic crises, millions of families continue to face financial problems from which they may never recover, according to research from the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society at the University of California, Berkeley.

The White House has made it official: President Obama has nominated San Antonio Mayor Julián Castro as the next Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Castro had been the rumored frontrunner for the position, but wasn't officially announced and hadn't accepted the nomination until recently.

Columbia Savings Bank of Cincinnati, Ohio was closed by the Ohio Division of Financial Institutions, which appointed the FDIC as receiver. The FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with United Fidelity Bank of Evansville, Indiana to assume the failed bank's deposits.

Mortgage Master, a mortgage lender and one of the country's largest privately-owned mortgage companies, announced it has opened a new retail branch office in Rye, New York. Mortgage Master currently has 27 retail branch offices throughout the Northeast.

Black Knight's Data and Analytics division released its latest Home Price Index (HPI), based on March 2014 residential real estate transactions. The group found that home prices rose 1.0 percent for the month, reflecting a yearly increase of 7.0 percent.

In an ongoing effort to improve housing education for consumers, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced it has awarded $40 million in grants to hundreds of national, regional, and local organizations to bolster housing counseling programs.

Homes are selling faster and at higher prices in the metropolitan Chicago real estate market in April, according to a recent analysis of market activity by RE/MAX. However, sales of distressed homes, either through foreclosure or short sales, fell off steeply for the month as the housing market continued to work through the foreclosure process.