Category Archives: Mortgage Information

Mortgages Get New Rules

Posted on February 17, 2014 | Leave a comment

If you need a mortgage to buy a home this year, the government wants to make sure you can pay back your loan.

That’s why on Jan. 10, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau implemented new mortgage-lending rules that federal regulators say will protect against the risky lending practices that powered the housing bubble and caused a huge collapse in home prices that led to the Great Recession.

For most home loan borrowers, the new rules will have little or no impact on whether they can get a mortgage, experts say, because loan standards have already been tightened.

“They want to make sure lenders are giving loans to borrowers who can afford to pay back those loans,” said David Neylan, vice president of correspondent and wholesale lending at Guild Mortgage, which is based in San Diego.

Here’s a look at the new rules and what they do:

Q: What is new?

A: The big term you need to know is qualified mortgage, or QM. A qualified mortgage meets new guidelines, and consumers who get them are expected to meet ability-to-repay requirements. If lenders make qualified mortgages, they have more protections against lawsuits should the loans later go bad.

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Complaints About Mortgage Servicers

Posted on February 15, 2014 | Leave a comment

Got problems with the company that services your home mortgage — the one that collects your payments, keeps track of your escrow account and lets you know when you’re late?

So your monthly numbers don’t look right? You got blown off by servicing personnel when you tried to get inaccuracies in your account corrected?

Well, move over. You’ve got lots of grumpy company.

As of Jan. 31, just under half of the 187,818 complaints filed with the federal watchdog Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) concerned mortgage foul-ups, and the vast majority of these involved servicing, loan modification and foreclosure activities by servicers.

But sometimes the problems go beyond run-of-the-mill ineptitude.

As part of its statutory functions, the CFPB sends investigators into the offices of mortgage-servicing firms to check their accounts for evidence of what it calls “unfair and deceptive practices.”

In their latest series of visits and supervisory audits, bureau auditors found shenanigans that might horrify unsuspecting homeowners: Abuses in mandatory cancellations of private mortgage insurance premiums.

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New Rules Toughen Credit Access – Mortgages

Posted on February 14, 2014 | Leave a comment

The verdict was nearly unanimous at a recent hearing on Capitol Hill: The new federal “ability to repay” and “qualified mortgage” regulations that took effect Jan. 10 will make obtaining credit tougher, not easier, this year, and potentially force large numbers of creditworthy home buyers to defer or cancel their plans.

What nobody addressed at the hearing, though, was the elephant in the room: OK, we’ve got a problem. But what, if anything, can buyers who find it difficult to meet the new standards do about it?

The testimony came from mortgage, banking and credit union leaders — even the head of a nonprofit Habitat for Humanity chapter. Though they didn’t dispute the good intentions of Congress or federal regulators in adopting the sweeping changes — banning or severely restricting most of the worst practices and loan features that facilitated the mortgage debacle of the last decade — they said the new rules amount to overkill.

disclaimer: for information and entertainment purposes only

Category Archives: Mortgage Information

Mortgages Get New Rules

Complaints About Mortgage Servicers

New Rules Toughen Credit Access – Mortgages

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