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Interthinx was awarded a Federal Supply Schedule contract by the General Services Administration (GSA) to sell its products and services directly to federal government organizations. The contract streamlines the government procurement process and allows government customers to buy offerings at pre-negotiated rates. Interthinx will offer government customers access to mortgage risk mitigation tools.

After a three-week lull, bank closings have returned. State and federal regulators shut down two community-based lenders on Friday, one in Michigan and one in Pennsylvania. There have been 151 bank failures so far this year. The FDIC said last month that its list of so-called problem banks has grown. There are now 860 insured financial institutions under greater scrutiny from the federal agency because capital levels have fallen dangerously low.

Ratings agency Standard & Poor's says mortgage servicers must provide documentation that their foreclosure processes are in compliance with foreclosure laws, or risk receiving a revised outlook or rating from the company. Many mortgage servicers have been under scrutiny recently because of reports of ""robo-signing."" S&P says it expects all residential servicers in its Select Servicer program to prove their compliance with proper foreclosure affidavit procedures by the end of first quarter of 2011.

The time mortgage loan servicers take to resolve delinquent loans through modification or foreclosure varies widely. According to an analysis by Moody's Investors Service, Bank of America has demonstrated the weakest performance measured both by its speed in resolving the status of delinquent loans and by its proportion of delinquent loans that have yet to be resolved. The ratings agency found that GMAC Mortgage, on the other hand, has generally performed better than its peers.

According to Showhomes, a nationally franchised network of home stagers, staging a vacant home can keep squatters from moving in, a rising problem in the struggling housing market. A total of 19 million homes were vacant in the first quarter of 2010, reports the U.S. Census Bureau. Squatters are even occupying million-dollar homes in what has been called ""mansion squatting."" Actor Randy Quaid and his wife were recently caught squatting inside a $1 million property they previously owned in Southern California.

Where do REOs take the largest piece of the home sales pie? According to data compiled by the independent real estate research and analytical firm Hanley Wood Market Intelligence, it's Modesto, California. In this Northern California city, Hanley Wood found that 60.5 percent of total home sales closings during the third quarter of this year were for bank-owned properties. By comparison, the company says the national average is 28 percent. REOs also comprised the majority of all home sales transactions in seven other metropolitan areas.

The Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland has released a report detailing the urgent need for measures to stabilize the housing market. The author says to allow the housing market to languish without powerful policy prescriptions jeopardizes recovery not only for housing but for the larger economy as a whole. One prominent suggestion put forth is a mortgage product that would combine job loss and home price decline protection features into one arrangement between the borrower and lender.

With few signs pointing to a solid economic recovery and the nation's unemployment rate hovering near a 26-year high, dissatisfaction remains prominent across the United States, especially in the financial services industry. According to a recent survey conducted by OneWire, a national financial services recruitment firm, 77 percent of finance professionals think the economic recovery has been largely unsuccessful. The responses indicate a departure from the rather hopeful outlook within the finance industry at the end of 2009.

MDA DataQuick, one of the nation's largest independent providers of property data to real estate and mortgage professionals, recently updated PropertyFinder 2G, the company's property research tool. Changes include expanded property details on distressed sales transactions and more accurate tracking. The technology gives users access to a nationwide database of detailed property and ownership information, including property profiles, sales comparables, demographic information, and property history.

Mortgage Industry Advisory Corporation (MIAC) just announced that it closed the sale of two Freddie Mac bulk mortgage servicing portfolios in November with a combined unpaid principal balance of approximately $2.5 billion. The portfolios carried delinquency rates of 1.28 percent and 3.87 percent. The New York-based brokerage says it will be marketing a $70 million Fannie Mae mortgage servicing deal later this month.