Attorneys for Standard & Poor's (S&P) filed Monday a motion to dismiss a civil lawsuit from the federal government accusing the ratings agency of inflating ratings and misrepresenting the creditworthiness of certain securities. Led by Attorney General Eric Holder, the Department of Justice announced in early February a complaint against S&P for allegedly defrauding investors in an attempt to gain more business. At the time, Holder noted that his department had identified more than $5 billion in losses to federally insured financial institutions resulting from collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) rated by S&P between March and December 2007.

Freddie Mac announced it is now offering a free, online CreditSmart tutorial to provide working families and new or inexperienced borrowers with basic sound information about building savings, personal credit, and making wise financial choices.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) released Tuesday its House Price Index (HPI) for February, revealing home prices rose 0.7 percent month-over-month on a seasonally adjusted basis. Year-over-year, U.S. house prices were up 7.1 percent in February, according to FHFA. As of February, the U.S. index rested at 196.3, 13.6 percent below its peak in April 2007 and was roughly the same as its October 2004 reading. FHFA's index has not declined on a monthly basis since January 2012.

As part of its ongoing efforts to assist the industry in the implementation of new mortgage guidelines, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued proposed amendments to address questions and clarify the qualified mortgage (QM) and servicing rules first laid out in January. The proposal addresses five topics, including debt-to-income ratio concerns surrounding the Ability to Repay Rule, uncertainties around the temporary QM provision, and which criteria are used to define ""small servicers.""

The infectious optimism surrounding the housing market has the majority of Americans feeling more positive, according to survey results from Gallup. Gallup found 51 percent of those surveyed said they expect home prices to rise in their area over the next year--the first time since 2007 that that number has been above 50 percent. Last year, only 33 percent of respondents gave the same answer. In this year's survey, 34 percent of Americans said prices will stay the same--down from 44 percent last year--while 14 percent said prices will fall, down from 23 percent.

MortgageDocs, a national notary signing services company based in California, has named Christian Redmond as its new CEO. Prior to his appointment at MortgageDocs, Redmond was VP of business development at the Walz Group, a case management and document fulfillment firm that handles critical communications between the mortgage servicing community and borrowers such as default and foreclosure notifications as well as loss mitigation packages.

Carrington Technology Solutions, LLC and Equator Business Solutions announced the commercial availability of RentPointe, Carrington's proprietary software application designed to meet the complexities of managing diverse portfolios of single-family rental properties.

According to Freddie Mac's Primary Mortgage Market Survey, the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaged 3.41 percent (0.7 point) for the week ending April 18, down from last week, when it averaged 3.43 percent. Last year at this time, the 30-year fixed averaged 3.90 percent. Meanwhile, Bankrate.com's weekly survey showed yet another three-month low for fixed rates. According to the site, the benchmark 30-year FRM average retreated to 3.61 percent from 3.64 percent previously.

Carrington Mortgage Services' Wholesale Lending Division announced it has added 14 professionals to its sales staff to better provide in-market services to brokers and borrowers.

BofA reported Wednesday net income of $2.6 billion for the first quarter of 2013, up from $653 million the same quarter last year. On the residential lending front, the company reported lower mortgage banking income, largely as a result of lower servicing income. However, first-lien mortgage production rose 57 percent to $24 billion, approximately 91 percent of which was for refinances. In addition, the number of 60-plus day delinquent first mortgage loans dropped by more than 100,000 from Q4, falling to 667,000.