News

The FDIC has requested comments from the industry on a new regulation that would limit safe harbor protections for assets, including mortgages, which have been securitized by failed banks. FDIC officials say the rule would return some confidence to the tenuous secondary market, but industry trade groups argue that it could have a counter effect of creating ""substantial uncertainty"" for investors and stifle an important financing channel.

According to a recent article written by Andrew Jakabovics, an associate director for housing and economics at the Center for American Progress, the Federal Housing Finance Administration's (FHFA) house price index (HPI) is a reminder that local markets behave differently over time, which strongly affects both lenders' and insurers' profitability, or lack thereof.

In an announcement Friday, Freddie Mac said effective September 1, 2010, it will no longer buy or securitize interest-only mortgages, including initial interest fixed-rate and adjustable-rate mortgages. The GSE reported earlier in the week that interest-only and Alt-A loans collectively accounted for 44 percent of its credit losses in 2009.

President Obama and his administration are floating an idea to prohibit lenders from foreclosing on a home unless the borrower has been considered for the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP). The proposal would also halt any foreclosures already in process once a borrower has been accepted into the trial phase of the program. A Treasury spokesperson confirmed that a foreclosure ban is under consideration, but stressed that it is one of many ideas on the table and has not been approved yet.

In an effort to improve its property search and map display, national real estate brokerage Zip Realty, Inc. has partnered with Maponics, LLC, a provider of neighborhood boundary data. ZipRealty, says the alliance will give prospective homebuyers better search results and local mapping data.

U.S. house prices declined modestly in the fourth quarter of 2009, according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency's (FHFA) seasonally-adjusted purchase-only house price index (HPI), which was calculated using home sales price information from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac-acquired mortgages.

Santa, Ana California-based First American Document Solutions, a member of the First American Corporation and a single point of access to a large land records database, recently announced that it has enhanced its online title policy and document retrieval capabilities.

The debate over the future of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac continues to heat up. The National Association of Realtors (NAR) released an unpublished proposal to DS News this week that advocates converting the two GSEs into government-chartered, non-profit corporations. Fannie and Freddie's own supervisory agency acknowledges that operating in conservatorship is not a long-term solution for the two companies, but the administration says it will not unveil its plan for the GSEs until 2011.

Georgia-based Altisource Solutions, Inc. has broadened its mortgage service offerings to include REO asset management operations. This recent expansion extends the company's real estate disposition and closing services to include oversight and coordination of the entire REO transaction lifecycle.

The administration's Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) is set to expire June 10. It's a central component of the government's foreclosure prevention efforts and is currently one of the only mortgage relief programs to help underwater borrowers. With the sunset date looming, several industry trade groups have joined forces to urge officials to extend HARP for another year, and they say a decision needs to be made quickly to prevent foreclosures on creditworthy borrowers.