Headlines

Troy, Michigan-based law firm Fabrizio & Brook has announced the hiring of a new attorney, Paul Poles, and the appointment of Managing Shareholder Jonathan Engman to sit as a case evaluator in Oakland County, Michigan.

Just as it reported for December's national index, Freddie Mac reported that January's national MiMi value of 74.6 indicated a weak housing market and even declined slightly (0.20 percent) month-over-month despite a year-over-year increase of 3.39 percent

The across-the-board increases in default risk can be attributed to the risk associated with nonbank lending, which is substantially higher than that of big bank loans, according to AEI. The composite NRMI was reported to be 11.93 percent in February, a slight increase of 0.1 percentage points from the prior three-month average and a jump of 0.8 percentage points year-over-year. The composite index just hit a series high of 11.94 percent in January.

In the opening arguments on Tuesday morning for two cases in the U.S. Supreme Court to determine the legality of extinguishing, or "stripping off" an underwater second mortgage as unsecured debt for a debtor in bankruptcy, an attorney representing Bank of America contended that the high court should uphold a 1992 decision that outlawed stripping off, while attorneys representing the debtors argued that the decision is irrelevant to these two cases.

Ohio-based SecureView, creator of a virtually unbreakable alternative board-up system made from recycled materials, has announced the nationwide expansion of its distribution network.

This will be the second time in as many months that Ocwen has announced an MSR sale on an Agency portfolio of residential loans to Dallas, Texas-based Nationstar. In February, Ocwen announced its intention to sell the MSR on a portfolio of about 81,000 performing residential loans owned by Freddie Mac with a UPB of about $9.8 billion to Nationstar.

Michigan-based real estate law firm Schneiderman & Sherman, P.C. has added three new attorneys – Steven Jacobs (litigation manager); Elina Fonarev (associate attorney in the litigation department); and Margaret Lukshaitis (junior associate attorney in the foreclosure department); and a new foreclosure manager, Kim Kress, to the firm.

In February, an independent study found many of Ocwen’s servicing business was "effective," according to the letter. The research, conducted by Morgan Stanley’s RMBS strategy team, stated, "Whether a borrower first went delinquent while being serviced by Ocwen, or fell delinquent and was then transferred to Ocwen, we find that these borrowers are more likely to be in their homes today than if the MSRs were held elsewhere."

The temporary factors that slowed economic growth include a drawdown in inventory, unusually high snowfall in some parts of the country, and the West Coast port slowdown. Fannie Mae expects the reducing of those factors in the second quarter combined with upbeat labor market conditions and positive consumer and business fundamentals to push GDP growth to 2.8 percent in 2015, ahead of 2014's pace of 2.4 percent.

Carrollton, Texas-based real estate solutions provider VRM Mortgage Services has announced that Tiffany Fletcher has been named SVP of compliance to manage risk mitigation, compliance, internal audits, quality assurance, and vendor management initiatives.