There is no independent auditor overseeing the federal agency responsible for some $6 trillion in home mortgages, because the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel ruled that the agency's inspector general didn't have authority to operate, according to internal memos obtained by...
What a difference 18 months can make. Need an example? Look no further than recent news from the GSEs that lenders are thumbing their noses at repurchase and reimbursement requests in record numbers. As reported in their quarterly filings, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are seeing an increase in the number...
A man in Detroit is in trouble for swapping food stamps for Viagra. I wonder how it went with his wife. "Did you get the groceries?" "No, but look at this!" The Wall Street Journal reports that, in line with the federal tax credit to purchase fuel efficient cars, the Federal government...
Not a week goes by that someone doesn't send me a script for a Hollywood movie based on mortgage banking . Usually it is either a) zany comedy starring Ben Stiller as a loan agent who doesn't know that the jumbo market has gone away, with Samuel L. Jackson as an irate borrower, b) an intense...
Time seems to fly in the mortgage banking business. Here we are, less than a week until the national conference in San Diego. Heck, here we are approaching Halloween! And I know that I am getting old when I wake up with that “morning-after feeling” and I didn't do anything the night before...
What’s not clear from yesterday's announcement is whether or not Fannie and Freddie are acting strategically or at the behest of Treasury or FHFA. Strategically this makes a lot of sense since the GSE’s have long supported a diverse market of loan sellers: credit unions, community banks...