Secondary Market

Few borrowers are asking lenders for adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) these days, what with all the bad publicity paid to ARM resets in the face of soaring foreclosures and borrowing costs for fixed mortgages now sitting at record lows. An annual report on the ARM market published by Freddie Mac Tuesday shows adjustable-rate mortgages accounted for just 3 percent of all conventional home purchase loans in 2009. That's the smallest piece of the pie for ARMs since at least 1982. At that time, they made up 62 percent of all new mortgages.

Ambac Assurance Corp., a business unit of bond insurer Ambac Financial Group Inc., has sued Credit Suisse Securities and its affiliate DLJ Mortgage Capital over mortgage-backed securities (MBS) Ambac insured in 2007. Ambac alleges the two investment companies hid information about the borrowers' ability to repay their loans, resulting in high default claims.

Mortgage interest rates for 30-year fixed loans are projected to hit 6.00 percent by the end of 2010, according to the latest housing and mortgage market outlook from the PMI Group. Long-term interest rates have generally headed higher since the end of November, and PMI expects this trend to continue, with a notable increase coming in Q2 when the Federal Reserve withdraws from the secondary mortgage market.

The FDIC is looking for a buyer for the $20 billion loan servicing portfolio it seized from AmTrust Bank last year, and the agency has chosen the investment advisory firm Milestone Merchant Partners in Washington, D.C. to manage the sale.

TenantAccess says it has an answer to that looming shadow inventory of foreclosures and REOs that so many analysts fear could get in the way of the nation's housing recovery and lead to a second round of price deterioration for residential properties.

In order to double its mortgage banking operation, Superior Bank of Alabama announced Tuesday that it will add more than 60 people to its existing operation.

It's no longer just a proposal the FDIC decided Thursday to implement a new payment structure for banks that requires them to prepay three years of insurance premiums. The agency also signaled that it is putting together new rules that would provide ""safe harbor"" protection for loans bundled in securities, essentially putting these assets out of the FDIC's reach if the selling institution goes under.

Since the market ""crash"" of last spring, The NYSE Financial Stock Index is up 137 percent.

Irvine, California's Real Estate Disposition Corp. (REDC) announced last week that it generated $24.9 million in sales in its just-completed national online foreclosure auction.

Home sales rose in 39 states last quarter and median prices rose 4 percent, offering hope for the residential market's immediate future, according to an industry report released Wednesday.