Category: News and Trends

In a new study by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, Cambridge, Mass., The Empty House Next Door: Understanding and Reducing Vacancy and Hypervacancy in the United States, researcher Allan Mallach said hypervacancy–defined as areas in which at least one in five properties are vacant within a given area–have disrupted neighborhoods and housing markets.

Real estate investment trust property-level fundamentals should remain positive at least through 2018, reported Fitch Ratings, New York.

The Mortgage Bankers Association has updated its Unfair, Deceptive or Abusive Acts or Practices Matrix as a member benefit.

Black Knight, Jacksonville, Fla., said rising home prices and interest rates have increased the monthly payment on a median-priced home purchased with a 20 percent down payment by $150 per month since the beginning of the year.

Commercial mortgage-backed securities credit quality deteriorated in the first quarter, as more than three-quarters of loans in multiple-borrower bonds were backed by interest-only mortgages, said Moody’s Investors Service, New York.

Last week, the Veterans Administration and Ginnie Mae each issued guidance implementing provision of S. 2155, the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief and Consumer Protection Act. However, these guidance have raised new concerns with the Mortgage Bankers Association and other industry trade groups.

The Mortgage Bankers Association, in a letter to the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, called on the Bureau to create an advisory council focused on the mortgage industry and urged the Bureau to ensure that it receives input from diverse and varied viewpoints, including those of independent mortgage banks.

Any way you look at it–and just about everyone is looking at it–the housing market continues to recover from the depths of its 2007 crisis.

CoreLogic, Irvine, Calif., released its 2018 CoreLogic Storm Surge Report, which shows that more than 6.9 million homes along the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts are at potential risk of damage from hurricane storm surge inundation with a total reconstruction cost value of more than $1.6 trillion.

Black Knight, Jacksonville, Fla., said mortgage delinquencies fell for the first time in seven months, bucking a seasonal trend and falling to its second-lowest level in 12 years.