New Yorkers for Responsible Lending (NYRL), a coalition of community organizations, housing advocacy centers and financial institutions, organized in Albany, New York, on Thursday to encourage the state’s governor and legislature to pass a comprehensive foreclosure prevention package before the legislative session ends in five weeks.

McLean, Virginia-based Freddie Mac, a stockholder-owned company created by the federal government to provide affordable housing, released its Primary Mortgage Market Survey (PMMS) on Thursday, which shows the 30-year fixed rate mortgage (FRM) fell from 6.

Fannie Mae Chief Executive Officer Daniel Mudd told shareholders Tuesday that he expects the housing correction will last through 2009 and describes the volatile real estate sector as the worst housing market this side of the Great Depression.

The National REO Brokers Association Inc. (NRBA) has concluded its Seventh Annual REO Education Conference-an event that attracted 450 attendees and furthered the association’s mission of raising thousands of dollars for Make-A-Wish.

A new nonprofit organization made up of mortgage default attorneys and other professionals who have an interest in preserving the integrity of the mortgage banking sector is now in the position to play a pivotal role in helping the federal government stabilize the housing market and focus on effective, long-term loss mitigation solutions.

Global investment bank UBS announced Wednesday that the company has officially completed the sale of its subprime and Alt-A U.S. residential mortgage-backed securities to investment management firm BlackRock.

Irvine, California-based Impac Mortgage Holdings, Inc., a real estate investment trust (REIT), announced this week that the company lost $2.0 billion, or $27.10 per diluted common share in 2007, a much greater loss when compared to the $75.

Ratings agency Moody’s Investors Service remains under a dark cloud of suspicion as the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) determines if it has jurisdiction to investigate an alleged computer code error at the ratings agency that allegedly resulted in Moody’s assigning the wrong credit rating to triple-A debt products, Reuters news reported Wednesday.

New York-based Fitch Ratings says in a new report that REO auctions will likely become more attractive to lenders and servicers who are dealing with an influx of foreclosures on their books. A recently completed Fitch survey showed over 60-percent of RMBS subprime servicers using auctions to liquidate REO holdings, a number that Fitch expects will continue to increase as servicers are faced with growing REO inventories and increasing loss severities, Fitch said in a recent report.

Rainbow City, Alabama-based online auction provider RealtyBid.com has more than doubled its business in the past year because of an influx of new properties and a string of new Web shoppers who are searching the site for deals.