Delinquency fees charged to forbearance-holders, payment handling violations, and pricing discrimination are among the mortgage-related violations highlighted by the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) latest Supervisory Highlights report. “Today’s report reveals that irresponsible or mismanaged firms harmed Americans during the COVID-19 pandemic,” said CFPB Director Rohit Chopra. “We will continue to supervise firms to halt harmful practices before they become widespread.” The report, which did not name particular companies, outlined illegal actions the CFPB claims to have observed in the first half of 2021. The CFPB supervises banks with assets of more than $10 billion and some non-banks, including mortgage companies, private student lenders, and payday lenders. The report called out mortgage lenders for the following: charging delinquency-related fees to…
By KIMBERLEY HAAS Mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have raised their limits on government-backed loans to $647,200 in most of the country and nearly $1 million in some high-cost American communities. Does that mean lenders are repeating the same mistakes which led to the 2008 crash? This 18% hike in the size of conforming loans is the highest single jump since at least 1970, outpacing the 15.9% increase seen in 2006. Two years later, on Dec. 30, 2008, the Case-Shiller home price index reported its largest drop in history. The credit crisis and housing bubble burst that followed led in part to the Great Recession in the United States. Now some observers fear U.S. markets are moving back to…
Both homeowners and lenders may be underestimating the rising cost of insurance following a growing number of natural disasters, according to a SitusAMC white paper titled “Weathering the Storm: Burgeoning Insurance Costs for Real Estate.” The paper found that natural disasters have impacted residential property nationwide, not just in areas with highly publicized disasters such as California and Florida. The states with the most natural disasters were Texas (where winter storms accounted for 40% in total insurance market losses in 2021), Virginia, and South Dakota. As the number of disasters rises and their severity intensifies, insurance companies will face more risk, leading to higher insurance premiums and reductions in coverage for property owners. “The growing number of climate events has…
By SCOTT KIMBLER The House version of President Biden’s “Build Back Better” plan includes about $170 billion for affordable housing and people are asking what that means. Biden’s spending plan includes $65 billion to preserve and rebuild public housing and another $15 billion to help build or preserve more than 150,000 rental properties for lower-income families. It’s part of the administration’s goal to build or preserve 1 million affordable homes. The bill is almost certain to change drastically in the U.S. Senate. But if the housing policies remain unchanged, what would this spending splurge mean for the overall housing market, at a time when prices are high and supply is low? The Mortgage Note spoke with Tom Smith, Ph.D. of…
After weeks of waiting, President Biden announced Monday he is renominating Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome H. Powell to another four-year term. Now analysts are asking what impact another Powell term will mean to mortgage rates and the housing market. The move has been characterized as a return to the status quo in which the Fed chairman is reappointed regardless of their political identity, a tradition former President Trump bucked when he appointed Powell. The Fed chairman question has been on many industry watchers’ minds in the last two weeks. Much was made of Biden’s sit down with Fed Governor Lael Brainard, seen as the most likely candidate if Biden chose to make a change. Brainard has instead been nominated as…
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) released a joint statement with other government agencies to mortgage servicers announcing a return to enforcement of protections for families and homeowners. The statement cited an April 2020 decision not to take “supervisory or enforcement action” regarding the timing requirements of the Regulation X mortgage servicing rules during the pandemic. The decision would last indefinitely “as long as the servicers made good faith efforts to provide those required notices or disclosures and took the related actions within a reasonable period of time. “ Wednesday’s statement from the CFPB walked back that flexibility, saying mortgage servicers have had plenty of time to adapt their operations to the ongoing challenges of Covid-19. The agencies will return…
By Kimberley Haas More than 250 rural, suburban and urban communities will benefit from $36 million earmarked to produce about 8,000 units of affordable housing throughout the country. U.S. Housing and Urban Development Deputy Secretary Adrianne Todman held a virtual press conference on Tuesday morning to announce the “capacity-building” awards, which are expected to stimulate nearly $150 million in total investments. “We are really focused on building strong and vibrant communities through grants like this and through the work of our local and state leaders,” Todman said. Todman said it has been thrilling to work with leaders at the White House and HUD to stand up these initiatives “that we know will pay dividends for our children and grandchildren in…
The Federal Reserve outlined a plan to begin tapering its emergency bond purchases. The purchases of $120 billion per month in Treasuries and mortgage-backed securities (MBS) were a government effort to keep financial markets afloat after the economic fall out from Covid-19. The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) met for two days this week then released a statement saying the Fed will begin tapering those purchases later this month. It will reduce its purchases of Treasury securities from $80 billion to $70 billion and from $40 billion to $35 billion for mortgage-backed securities. “In light of the substantial further progress the economy has made toward the Committee’s goals since last December, the Committee decided to begin reducing the monthly pace…
New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed legislation expanding the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) ‘s anti-redlining requirements to non-depository lenders. The New York Senate delivered the bill to Governor Hochul on Friday. Now that the bill is signed, it will become law in 90 days. The CRA is national legislation enacted in 1977 in response to the redlining of poor and minority communities by banks during the 1960s and 1970s. Several states, including Massachusetts, Illinois, and New York, have their own versions. New York’s largely mirrors the federal law. It mandates that banks help meet the credit needs of communities in which they take deposits, specifically in low- and moderate-income neighborhoods. The expansion diverges from federal law, however. A New York…
Lawrence H. Summers, who served as Bill Clinton’s Treasury Secretary and was one of Barack Obama’s chief economic advisors, says “housing inflation is almost certain to soar in coming months,” and he’s taking the current Treasury chief to task over her rosy view of inflation. Former Treasury Secretary Summers has been sounding the alarm over inflation for months, even as current Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has claimed the problem is “transitory” and not a significant threat to the economy. In response, Summers has criticized the Biden administration’s economic response to the pandemic, warning that rising inflation isn’t a temporary concern but a long-term problem the Fed will have trouble reining in. “We are printing money, we are creating government bonds,…
