Team Thayer Property Servicing

House prices inched up 0.4 percent in May, on a seasonally adjusted basis from the previous month, according to the  Federal Housing Finance Agency’s  monthly House Price Index. The previous month was revised up from 0.3 percent percent change in April to instead reflect a 0.4 percent change. Then index is based on home sales price information from mortgages sold to or guaranteed by  Fannie Mae  and  Freddie Mac . From May 2014 to May 2015, house prices were up 5.7 percent. For comparison, the U.S. index is 1.8 percent below its March 2007 peak and is roughly the same as the April 2006 index level.  For the nine census divisions, seasonally adjusted monthly price changes from April 2015 to May 2015 ranged from -0.6 percent in the East South Central division to 1.1 percent in the East North Central division. In addition, the 12-month changes were all positive, ranging from +0.9 percent in the M...

The Royal Bank of Scotland ( RBS ) may have to pay as much as $13 billion in a mortgage-backed securities lawsuit filed by the Federal Housing Finance Agency ( FHFA ), according to multiple media reports . FHFA made a filing in the U.S. District Court in Connecticut in late June seeking $13 billion in damages, according to a  report from Bloomberg . RBS was one of 18 lenders sued by the FHFA in 2011 to recoup U.S. taxpayer costs following the government's $187.5 billion bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in 2008. The lawsuit against RBS in the Connecticut court involved  the selling of about $32 billion worth  of faulty mortgage-backed securities to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac before the crisis. The bank had  set aside about $3 billion  for a possible settlement but reports surfaced that the FHFA might ask as much as $7.7 billion. The case should go to trial sometime in 2016 if a settlement is not reached. Analysts from Bloomberg Intelligence predict...