News

The U.S. Senate has voted down legislation that would allow bankruptcy court judges to modify the interest rate, terms, or even principal balance owed on primary-residence mortgages. After passing by a good margin in the House in early March, the cramdown bill failed in the Senate on Thursday by a vote of 45 to 51.

Southfield, Michigan’s Woodward Asset Capital, LLC has announced the launch of OfferSubmission.com, a proprietary web-based software program that allows mortgage asset owners to control the REO disposition process, while providing transparency for real estate agents and institutional sellers.

The first 100 days of President Barack Obama’s administration have been marked by pressure to stabilize and reverse the nation’s financial crisis, and in doing so, establish regulatory reform within the financial and lending communities.

Jacksonville, Florida’s Lender Processing Services (LPS), Inc. released its latest LPS Mortgage Monitor this week, which provides mortgage industry performance indicators as of March month-end. Among the findings, LPS reported that the number of newly delinquent loans declined in March to 7.

The U.S. Senate approved a bill this week that will give federal investigators new resources and additional funding to combat mortgage crimes and housing scams. According to officials, an estimated 5,000 new mortgage fraud cases are reported every month.

The single-family median home price in Rhode Island fell 25.9 percent in the first quarter compared to the same period in 2008, according to a report released Thursday by The Warren Group, which provides real estate data for the New England area.

The government has said its Home Affordable Refinance Program will lower monthly mortgage payments for four to five million homeowners. The initiative targets those home loans that are held by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the administration has expanded the eligibility pool by allowing borrowers to refinance even if they owe 5 percent more than the home’s current market value.

Freddie Mac released the results of its Primary Mortgage Market Survey (PMMS) on Thursday, which showed that rates for fixed-rate mortgages this week lingered at their record lows and those for adjustable-rate mortgages also eased.

The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) has released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending April 24, 2009, which showed that despite high affordability conditions within the marketplace, the number of people applying for a home loan dropped significantly last week.

Sales of single-family homes in Massachusetts during the first quarter dropped nearly 11 percent, according to a market report released Wednesday by the Boston-based research firm The Warren Group. During the first three months of the year, the company said 6,160 homes were sold in the Bay State, down from 6,912 for the same period last year.