Team Thayer Property Servicing

Lenders across the U.S. appear to be offering borrowers a second chance at obtaining a mortgage by originating more subprime mortgages for borrowers with credit scores under 620. Equifax 's recent  National Consumer Credit Trends Report  found that subprime mortgage originations soared higher during the first five months of 2015. First mortgages, home equity installment (HE) loans, and home equity lines of credit (HELOCs) all experienced an uptick in subprime originations compared to the same period last year. The amount of first mortgage originations to borrowers with subprime credit scores increased 30.5 percent, HE loans rose 29.5 percent, and HELOCs rose 20.4 percent. "It appears that American lenders still believe in second chances, and without subprime loans, there would be no second chances in the housing market." Equifax explained that although subprime orginations are rising, overall, these originations are only a small portion of total originations a...

  Good credit is well worth the effort it takes to both achieve and preserve it. If you have good credit, the following tips will help you keep it that way. If you want to improve your credit, however, now is the time to get started. Give us a call. We'll review your credit and find out exactly where you stand. In the meantime, if you plan on entering into a loan transaction in the next 6 to 12 months, you simply cannot afford to make the following credit mistakes: Don't fall behind on existing accounts.  This includes your mortgage and car payments. One 30-day late can cost you anywhere from 30-80 points or more depending on the other factors being reported on your credit reports. Don't pay off old collections or charge-offs during the loan process.  Paying collections will decrease your credit score immediately due to the "date of last activity" becoming recent. If you want to pay off old accounts, do it through closing, and make sure that 1) you validate...

From DS News: Consumer attitudes toward the real estate market slid down in August due to economic concerns, Fannie Mae  reported in its newly-launched  Home Purchase Sentiment Index  (HPSI). In August 2015, the HPSI fell 0.5 points from July to 80.8, Fannie Mae said. The sentiment level is also down from the peak reached in June 2015 of 84.7 and the index is up 5.3 points from August 2014. “Consumer attitudes toward the current home selling climate have slid back to their April 2015 level, contributing to a slight decline in the August HPSI reading relative to its four-year high, reached two months ago,” said Doug Duncan, SVP and chief economist at Fannie Mae. “Expectations of rising mortgage rates and increasing concerns in the last six months about the direction of the economy seem to be weighing on consumers’ assessment of the housing market." "Expectations of rising mortgage rates and increasing concerns in the last six months abo...

Foreclosure metrics were way down across the board again in July 2015, as pre-sale foreclosure inventory dropped to its lowest level since December 2007 and completed foreclosures were down by nearly 25 percent year-over-year, according to  CoreLogic 's  July 2015 National Foreclosure Report  released Tuesday. Completed foreclosures for July 2015 totaled approximately 38,000, which was a 24.4 percent declined from the previous July's total of 50,000. July 2015's total represented a 68 percent decline from the peak number of completed foreclosures (117,225) reached in September 2010. Completed foreclosures, which are a true measure of homes lost to foreclosure, have totaled 5.8 million nationwide since the financial crisis began in September 2008 and 7.8 million since homeownership rates peaked in Q2 2004, according to CoreLogic. While monthly completed foreclosure totals have been on the steady decline, July's total of 38,000 is still about 80 percent higher than t...

Freddie Mac  has announced that as part of the periodic review, state foreclosure timelines have been extended in 34 of 55 jurisdictions including Oregon  for all foreclosure sales completed on or after Aug 1, 2015. The temporary suspension of state foreclosure timeline compensatory fee assessments in the District of Columbia, New York (including New York City), and New Jersey has been extended from June 30, 2015, to December 31, 2015, according to Freddie Mac. The Enterprise originally announced the temporary suspension in the  Single-Family Seller/Servicer Guide Bulletin 2014-19.  The temporary suspension and the extended foreclosure timelines recently announced will be discussed in Freddie Mac's October 2015 Guide Bulletin. Freddie Mac extended state foreclosure timelines as follows as part of the periodic review. The length of time is measured in calendar days, and the number of days here refers to the maximum number of allowable days between the due da...

The  J.D. Power   2015 U.S. Primary Mortgage Servicer Satisfaction study  released Thursday found that servicers are spending too much time and resources focusing on at-risk customers, negatively impacting satisfaction for the majority of their customers. "While servicers must be prepared to work within the confines of industry regulations, they must also effectively satisfy customers whose expectations regarding technology and personal service are rapidly changing," the survey said. "To meet these challenges and remain competitive, mortgage servicers need to understand and implement key best practices that have the greatest potential to reduce or prevent problems, contain costs, and create positive customer experiences that improve brand perceptions and minimize oversight risk." At-risk customers, those that J.D. Power defines currently behind in their mortgage payments or concerned about keeping current during the next year, represent only 15 percent o...

As a listing agents we must vet the buyer's and lenders, so I put together a short list of questions I would recommend asking the lender when you receive an offer. 1.  Have you verified income? About 99 percent of the time, the pre-qual letter you are looking at is based on stated income, and nothing has been confirmed. Most buyers do not know how Fannie/Freddie calculate income, and many end up providing income figures that are higher than the income the loan officer can use for qualification purposes. A client who is pre-qualified using an inflated income figure could easily no longer qualify if usable income decreases. 2.  Have you verified funds to close? This one is pretty obvious, but for some reason many lenders do not verify the buyer’s assets prior to sending you a prequal letter. Save everyone a headache, and make sure the lender has verified assets before accepting an offer. 3.  Has the loan been underwritten by an actual underwriter, or do you ...

according to  Freddie Mac's May 2015 Monthly Volume Summary . May's expansion marked the eighth time in the last nine months the portfolio has expanded. The only month in that time frame the portfolio did not grow was in January, when it contracted at an annualized rate of 0.8 percent. Year-to-date for the first five months of 2015, the portfolio has expanded at an average annualized rate of 1.2 percent. The balance of Freddie Mac's total mortgage portfolio has grown from $1.898 trillion up to $1.919 trillion since August 2014. Though the portfolio has seen expansion in eight of the last nine months, May was only the 16th time in the last 65 months that the portfolio has expanded dating back to January 2010. The number of homeowners who received permanent loan modifications totaled 5,490 for May, a slight increase from 5,306 in April. With 25,417 modifications to date in 2015, Freddie Mac is averaging 5,083 modifications per month. An average of 5,596 permanent lo...

Approximately 94.2 percent of first-lien mortgages serviced by eight national banks were  current and performing at the end of the first quarter , an improvement of more than a full percentage point from a year earlier, according to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's Q1 2015 Quarterly Mortgage Metrics Report released Thursday. The eight national banks covered in the OCC's report are (alphabetically) Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Citibank, HSBC, OneWest Bank, PNC, U.S. Bank, and Wells Fargo. The mortgages covered in the OCC's report comprised 43.9 percent of all outstanding residential mortgages in the country, which total 22.7 million loans and approximately $3.8 trillion in unpaid principal balance. Mortgage performance improved across the board for the eight national banks in Q1. The share of performing first-lien mortgages improved from 93.1 percent up to 94.2 percent, the share of mortgages that were 30 to 59 days overdue declined by 7 percent yea...