Does your company have a decent product for a borrower who crowd-funded their down payment? How about a house with a granny unit in the back? Trends in lending and real estate, right? How about anyone who is buying a place to live in a converted office building or mall? I hope so, as that is certainly “a thing.” Obviously, it takes a different skill set. Speaking of which, here at the MBA’s conference in Manhattan someone was telling me, “Many companies have momentarily stopped reducing overhead and are prepared for an increase in volume: ‘re-flate.’” Overhead is obviously a topic: If an LO doesn’t need a branch or manager, why should their borrower pay for them, and the overhead, through worse pricing? And in terms of cutbacks, is “furloughing” just IMBs kicking the can down the road? On the banking and credit union side, those institutions have proven adept at finding other places for personnel not needed in reside
I head to Colorado Springs this morning, the scene of $3,000 mountain bikes in bike racks on top of $500 cars. There are roughly 380 bank branches in the city, including mortgage lender NBH. On the flip side, do you work at a non-depository bank, like a mortgage bank or broker? You should know that the Treasury’s Financial Stability Oversight Council voted unanimously to issue (for public comment) new proposed interpretative guidance on the Council’s procedures for designating nonbank financial companies for Federal Reserve supervision and enhanced prudential standards to replace the Council’s existing guidance and describes the procedural steps the Council would take in considering whether to designate a nonbank financial company. This follows the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's (CFPB) proposal to bring more nonbank financial companies under its direct supervision. (Today’s podcast can be found here and is sponsored by LoanCare, a Fidelity Na
Carol K. writes, “Back in my day there was so much cheap toilet paper and eggs that we would throw them at the houses of our enemies.” And then there’s, “Money can't buy you happiness, but you can sure have a good time searching for it.” Speaking of a good time, are you single? Want to make $1,500? Shane Co. will pay you to go on 15 first dates. Search for dates at the grocery store, a dating app, whatever. Many lenders are searching for production, and with that in mind, is your company participating in the FHFA’s Special Purpose Credit Program? Rumor has it that those lenders in the pilot program must pay up to $5,000 per loan… but what do I know? If true, is that added to the $11k the MBA tells us it already takes to do a loan? There’s even a “tool kit.” And of course the CFPB is keenly interested in these types of programs. Any questions about participating or NDAs or procedures should be addressed to you
“Someone asked me to name two structures that hold water. I was like, well, damn.” As the storms continue to hit us in Northern California and Nevada, not only is my cat Myrtle ticked off, but we are reminded that it is either feast or famine in the Golden State. Take your pick, forest fires or biblical rain: Over 20 trillion gallons of water are supposed to fall on California in a two-week span. Yes, that’s with a “t.” Ratcheting back several decimal places, new estimates from the Census Bureau found that the U.S. population grew by only 0.38 percent from July 2021 to July 2022, which was the second-lowest growth on record behind just the 0.16 percent growth registered during the first year of the pandemic. The main thing increasing it was an increase in net immigration. To find comparably low rates one has to go back to the worst of the Great Depression, when growth was still a comparably robust 0.6 percent. All told, for those who don’t beli