Tag Archives: Fannie Mae

A little more than half of American renters believe owning a home is a more sensible choice than living in rental housing, according to a research study from Fannie Mae's Economic & Strategic Research Group. At 57 percent, young renters (ages 18-34) were more likely to answer that owning is the better choice. Out of those who would prefer to own, many find themselves blocked by a number of hurdles. The most commonly cited problem was a lack of assets; 67 percent of aspiring owners have less than $10,000 in assets.

RoundPoint Mortgage Servicing Corporation announced the adoption of a Fannie Mae tool designed to help servicers work faster when assisting borrowers with foreclosure prevent efforts.

In an effort to speed up the short sale process, Fannie Mae is increasing early communication with real estate agents by asking listing agents to register accepted short sale offers with the GSE. By registering offers, Fannie Mae says there will be greater transparency in the process and it will also allow the GSE to be more proactive when working with servicers to complete short sales. Through Fannie Mae's site Homepathforshortsales.com agents can register their short sale offers.

Shadow inventory held by the GSEs and HUD "vastly" outnumbers REO properties the groups maintain, according to a joint report from the Office of Inspector General for the Federal Housing Finance Agency and HUD. The report further warned HUD and the GSEs must pay close attention to shadow inventory, which threatens to increase their supply of REOs. For the GSEs, the ratio of shadow inventory to REO inventory was about 6-to-1, while shadow inventory for HUD was 19.9 times greater than REO inventory.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac reminded servicers of mortgage relief options available to homeowners whose residences were affected by the tornado that ravaged areas in Oklahoma.

The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) shared a proposal to bring private capital back into the mortgage market while decreasing costs for taxpayers and borrowers. In a recent paper, the MBA explained the up-front risking sharing concept, which calls for the GSEs to offer risk-sharing at the front end of transactions. The proposal also suggested Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac should accept loans with ""deeper levels of credit enhancement"" in exchange for reduced guarantee fees and other loan level charges.

Fiscal drags such as the sequester may have weakened economic momentum, but the economy should ""reaccelerate"" in the second half of this year as financial and housing conditions improve, according to Fannie Mae's Economic and Strategic Research Group. ""Employment numbers are getting better, albeit it at a relatively slow pace, and the April employment picture should help boost consumer sentiment toward the economy overall,"" said Doug Duncan, chief economist for Fannie Mae.

Lender Processing Services, Inc. introduced the web-based Workout Interaction Tool (WIT), which provides data from its MSP servicing system to and from Fannie Mae’s Servicing Management Default Underwriter (SMDU) platform. LPS' WIT provides mortgage servicers with access to Fannie Mae's SMDU to provide consistent, real-time decisions on loan modifications and other workout solutions for struggling homeowners.

In the first quarter of this year, the mortgage giant reported pre-tax income of $8.1 billion, the largest in its history. Fannie Mae attributed the improvement to ""strong credit results driven by an increase in home prices, including higher average sales prices on Fannie Mae-owned properties, a decline in the number of delinquent loans, and the company's resolution agreement with Bank of America."" The GSE also announced it will pay $59.4 billion to Treasury.

In the latest in its Transition to ""Normal"" series, Fannie Mae's Economic and Strategic Research group examines the residential construction sector, which lost 41 percent of jobs between 2006 and 2011 due to the housing bust. If housing starts return to normal levels in 2016, residential construction employment is predicted to rise to nearly 2.5 million jobs, an increase of 412,000 over current levels. Despite that gain, homebuilding employment is forecast to remain nearly 1 million less than it was at the peak of the housing boom.