FHFA report highlights changes in foreclosures and related activities during the third quarter. Delinquency rates improve while real estate owned (REO) declines for Fannie, Freddie.

Finding a place with affordable rent can be as difficult as finding love for singles. But these cities are likely to give them the best of both.

New tools are easing the loan handoff from origination to servicing, and helping servicers better predict borrowers who are at risk of default. Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared in the July issue of DS News, out now.

Editors Note: This article was originally featured in the August issue of DS News. Mortgage and real estate-related investment opportunities abound throughout various securities and properties, as long as investors take the steps necessary to understand the underlying market conditions—and ...

Government agencies are seeing an increase in participation within the mortgage servicing space and are seeking to provide better insight into some of the new and growing players in the market, a panel of experts told the audience at a mortgage industry conference in Chicago this week. Dave Williams of Amerisave Mortgage Corp., David Allison with Dovenmuehle Mortgage, and representatives from Fannie Mae and Ginnie Mae all shared their thoughts with conference-goers on servicing mortgages for secondary market investors.

Mortgage servicing took center stage at a mortgage banking conference in Chicago on Monday, with industry experts making a case for reform. Panelists at a session on the future of mortgage servicing assured attendees that in five years, the servicing business ""will look nothing"" like it does today. Executives from such organizations as Freddie Mac, Amherst Securities, and the University of North Carolina advocated for national servicing standards, greater transparency, and new compensation structures.

HomeServices of America, headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, has formed a national title and closing network. The new network provides ""brick & mortar"" title and closing services in all 50 states. Local providers handle transactions, while the network provides a single point-of-contact for all title and closing services nationwide.

Santa Ana, California-based CoreLogic has exceeded 1 million active real estate listings on its Partner InfoNet program, which started operation in June 2010. Partner InfoNet is a revenue sharing program in which multiple listing services (MLSs) license their listing data to CoreLogic for use in risk management products for mortgage lenders, servicers, and capital markets. The program represents more than 300,000 real estate professionals.

Nearly 10.9 million, or 22.5 percent, of all residential mortgages had negative equity at the end of the second quarter of the year, according to a report released Tuesday by the analytics firm CoreLogic. The figure is actually a slight improvement from the 22.7 percent of all mortgages with negative equity in the first quarter of 2011. CoreLogic says nearly three-quarters of homeowners in negative equity situations are also paying higher, above-market interest on their mortgages.

While the Obama administration is still working through the specifics with the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) on how to open up refinancing to more borrowers, Keefe, Bruyette and Woods - an investment bank specializing in financial services - notes the most likely course of action is a moderate expansion of the Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) rather than a broad refinance program. Even a HARP expansion is likely to be modest at best, the research said.