MBA Newslinks Archive

“Servicers have a tendency to look at a green screen and see a property, a name and an address. When you go to the neighborhood itself, you get a whole different perspective.”
–James Taylor, Senior Vice President of Asset Management and Preservation with Wells Fargo Home Mortgage, San Francisco.

“The goal is to meet the customer with their preferred platform so that we can communicate better and lead with value. You’re selling a solution; you’re selling an opportunity.”
–Eric Selk, executive director of the HOPE NOW Alliance, Washington, D.C.

“As the job market has improved and national home prices have rebounded, fewer borrowers were becoming seriously delinquent, while borrowers previously behind on their payments were in a better position to pursue alternative options to resolve delinquent loans.”
–MBA Vice President of Industry Analysis Marina Walsh.

“We have come a long way and have been largely successful because of our common goal. Industry, policymakers and consumer advocates all want to provide consumers with quality loan servicing. We want a strong servicing market that allows us to do business and works well for consumers.”
–MBA Vice Chair J. David Motley, CMB.

“Questions arise about future [small-cap commercial real estate] leasing momentum. Despite the elevated year-end demand figures, annual demand trailed the high-water mark set in 2014 during the post-financial crisis era.”
–Randy Fuchs, Principal with Boxwood Means, Stamford, Conn.

“It’s time to think differently about how taxpayer-backed entities, especially those regulated by the FHFA, can be deployed to serve the entire housing market and not just a limited set of participants. The housing finance system is rapidly innovating new business models, in response to new economic and demographic fundamentals and new regulation. We must think differently about making sure liquidity and capital can support all qualified, compliant companies that serve today’s housing community.”
–MBA President and CEO David Stevens, CMB, in an op-ed calling for changes to the Federal Home Loan Bank System’s membership criteria.

“Those under 35 stay employed at the same place for an average of three years, so buying may not make sense for them, from a financial standpoint, even if paying a mortgage would be more affordable.”–Zillow Chief Economist Svenja Gudell.

“VA should issue a final Qualified Mortgage rule that establishes clear, bright lines for VA lending. And once the final rule is issued, we hope they will permit an appropriate implementation period so that smaller lenders like our company have the time we need to test our systems and ensure we are in full compliance.”
–James Danis II, CMB, AMP, President of Residential Mortgage Corp., Fayetteville, N.C., testifying yesterday on behalf of MBA before a House VA subcommittee.

“Whether it’s by keeping interest rates well below the normalized rate such as the U.S. or by moving forward with the additional capital injections occurring in many other countries, the bottom line is that [central banks] will continue to take extraordinary measures to prolong this business cycle. And more likely than not, those extraordinary measures will continue to create a highly robust–albeit highly uneven–real estate environment.”
–Kevin Thorpe, Chief Economist with Cushman & Wakefield, New York.

“While we would typically expect a market downtrend this time of the year due to an overall lower level of activity in the real estate market, there is added volatility in the market due to the implementation of TRID, the broader economic slowdown and the string of bad runs in the equity markets.”
–Alex Villacorta vice president of research and analytics with Clear Capital, Reno, Nev.