Headlines

Freddie Mac's weekly Primary Mortgage Market Survey, released Thursday, showed the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaging 4.32 percent (0.6 point) for the week ending March 20, down from last week, when it averaged 4.37 percent. A year ago, the 30-year FRM average was 3.54 percent.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) released findings on the reporting of Federal Home Loan Bank (FHLB) director expenses. The OIG found, "FHFA has not included information about FHLBank director expenses in its annual reports to Congress, as required by HERA."

Medallion Analytics announced it is rolling out Medallion Vendor Scorecard, a reporting tool that provides a loan-level analysis of errors made throughout the post-closing process. The scorecard gives lenders an overall picture of their settlement services vendors' performances.

Mortgage document preparation vendor International Document Services, Inc. (IDS) and MortgageFlex Systems, a provider of mortgage loan software, announced the development of a joint interface between IDS's flagship mortgage document preparation system idsDoc and MortgageFlex's LoanQuest loan origination system (LOS).

According to the latest market analysis report released Thursday by Zillow, whether a buyer or a seller has the upper hand in home sales this spring will depend largely on which part of the country their deal takes place.

Ellie Mae released its Origination Insight Report, which noted falling mortgage rates, shrinking refinances, and loosening of credit restrictions in the month of February. Ellie Mae's report, culled from 57 percent of Ellie Mae's mortgage application data, found that the average rate for a 30-year mortgage fell to 4.65 percent.

Officials at the Federal Reserve voted this week to continue cutting back its stimulative monthly asset purchases despite signs of a slowdown in economic growth to start the year.

Three nonprofit consumer groups filed suit against California Governor Jerry Brown at the end of last week, alleging the governor misdirected funds from the landmark $25 billion national servicing settlement with the nation’s largest banks.

Fitch Ratings announced it has finalized its criteria for analyzing loans securing U.S.residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) under the new qualified mortgage (QM) and Ability-to-Repay rule (the Rule) recently adopted by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).

NeighborWorks America announced Tuesday in a press release that $63.1 million had been awarded to 29 state housing finance agencies, 18 HUD-approved housing counseling intermediaries, and 67 community-based NeighborWorks organizations. The money, provided through the National Foreclosure Mitigation Counseling (NFMC) program, is earmarked for counseling to families and individuals facing the threat of foreclosure.