Sales, Innovation Jobs; CEO Role Wanted; Webinars; Compliance, Database Tools; Disaster Updates
Are you sure that the underwriter or processor working from home isn’t working simultaneously, on a different laptop, for another company besides yours? My guess is that it would be exhausting, unethcial, and would never happen. Except an owner of a small mortgage bank in Wisconsin wrote to me Saturday saying they’d just fired someone for doing exactly that! And here’s a zinger, as companies continue to hire WFH (“work from home,” not WTF) employees. K&L Gates writes, “Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, many state taxing authorities asserted that a business could become subject to their states’ tax obligations by having a single employee working from within the states, even if there were no other connections between the business and those states. As a result, some states tried to force such businesses to comply with employer withholding obligations, to pay income, franchise, gross receipts, or other business taxes and to comply with certain other state tax requirements.” Almost as scary as a poodle’s haircut making it look like a skeleton for Halloween.
Lender Products and Services
Business Intelligence is more than just reporting. Mortgage companies need information faster than ever from more systems than ever. Leaders need insights quickly that they can share with the whole team to find efficiencies and drive growth. Your data should tell you when it’s time to act. RM Analyze is built by mortgage experts to empower leaders with contextual data that makes a real difference. Our implementations focus on a fast set up with the expert consulting you need to make a big impact. Learn more and contact us to get started today!
Truepic helps OneTrust Home Loans (“OneTrust”) verify that employee home work stations are in compliance. Truepic's virtual inspection platform is being used by OneTrust, a national mortgage bank and balance sheet lender, to confirm that its employees home work stations are in compliance with company and industry standards. OneTrust is leveraging Truepic's technology to verify everything from internet speed and connection, possession of shredders and printers as well other pertinent items and information. Truepic technology enables employees to capture 100% authentic and verified photos and videos directly from their own smartphone while running fraud detection and prevention tests behind every image submitted. This process allows OneTrust to have confidence their Employees are adhering to best practices and mandated requirements. Click here to learn more or to schedule a live-demo via a screenshare email: sales@truepic.com.
23,844 people in your database are ready for a RE-FI. Don’t let your competitors go fishing for your borrowers. “Look at the opportunity cost you have by not having Sales Boomerang. Last year we closed over $72M in loans that we would have lost from not having Sale Boomerang.” (Stephen Barton, EVP, Eustis Mortgage) “In the first 4 months we took in $180M in applications and we have about 100 LOs. That is a significant impact to our business. My top performing LO attributes 25% of her business to Sales Boomerang alerts.” (Katherine Campbell, CMO, Assurance Financial) The numbers speak for themselves: 20x Avg. ROI, $240 Avg Cost Per Acquired Loan, 10-20% Avg Lift to Loan Volume. Want to see exactly how much you lost this year? Schedule a demo today. We will show you which competitor took your deal, the loan amount, type, term and much more.
Company-Sponsored Webinars
Momentifi CEO Gibran Nicholas will be hosting two on-demand webinars this week: Texting for Dollars: How to save time and get five times better results by using text messages for sales follow-up or to request documents; and, How to assign yourself and your team a “business mobile number” in order to stay compliant and maintain personal privacy while working remotely. Click here to register for “Texting for Dollars” and you’ll get a free copy of the recording. The second webinar is Financial StorySelling in an Upside-Down World: How to use story archetypes to gain a competitive advantage during this election season and in the post-COVID world; and, Three possible ways the 2020 Presidential election could impact interest rates, and how to prepare clients and referral partners for different scenarios. Click here to register for Financial StorySelling and you’ll get a free copy of the recording.
Last chance to register for tomorrow’s webinar featuring leading economic and loan servicing experts Allan Weiss (co-founder of Case-Shiller Weiss), Sean Ryan ( CEO, Aspen Grove Solutions), Joe Chappell (EVP Covius Settlement Services) and Pete Pannes (Chief Business Officer of Covius/RealtyBid). Register today for insight into 2021 housing prices, latest default projections, best REO/Auction strategies and more.
COVID, Floods, Fires, Hurricanes
For today’s “good news, bad news” scenario, the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) was extended… But only for a year. A continuing resolution came along last week, funding the government to December 11, allowing politicians to focus on campaigning, and extending insurance writing authority for the National Flood Insurance Program through September 30, 2021. While nearly everyone would like to see a long-term extension so that we don’t have to worry about this every year, there are humans dealing with some terrible and tragic events In the U.S.
The Atlantic has seen its 24th named storm with Gamma, which will bring flooding and rain to Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula and then carry on into the southern Gulf of Mexico this week. This is the fastest that a hurricane season has reached 24 named storms, and it is, so far, the second most active hurricane season on record, behind only 2005 with its 28 named storm systems.
Many cities and counties have their own disaster plans. For example, properties purchased in Baltimore City’s Special Flood Hazard Area with federally-back loans are required to have flood insurance. Baltimore City participates in the Federal Emergency Management Administration’s Community Rating System (CRSS), and its current rating allows property owners to receive a 25% discount on flood insurance for properties located in the SFHA and 10% on flood insurance for properties located outside of the SFHA.
A disaster declaration by FEMA sets in motion changes in policies and procedures nationwide. Who’s doing what about them?
FHA issued a temporary partial waiver and corresponding housing directive waiver of deferral of due and payable status for eligible non-borrowing spouses due to COVID-19 national emergency.
loanDepot Wholesale is monitoring several disaster areas and will provide updates as additional information and containment statuses become available. These include Hurricane Laura with more than a dozen Louisiana designated Parishes impacted, the Oregon Wildfires with seven counties designated, and the California Wildfires with several counties. Refer to loanDepot Wholesale's Disaster Center for more details.
Flagstar Bank is suspending funding for properties located in FEMA declared disaster areas.
9/17/2020 updates are posted in Memo 20089-Oregon Wildfires, Memo 20091-Washington Wildfires, Memo 20085- Hurricane Laura, Memo 20079-California Wildfires.
Mountain West Financial Wholesale posted Revised Bulletin 20W-115 regarding California Wildfires.
First Community Mortgage posted updates to Disaster Announcements. Click a link to view DA-20-6 Florida Hurricane Sally and DA-20-5 Alabama Hurricane Sally
Carrington Mortgage issued Announcement 20-0062: Updated FEMA Disaster Declaration for California.
AmeriHome Mortgage published the updated information for five Florida counties granted federal disaster aid with individual assistance to supplement state and local recovery efforts in the areas affected by Hurricane Sally. These counties include Bay, Escambia, Okaloosa, Santa Rosa, and Walton.
Flagstar Bank is allowing loan closings and funding to resume for California properties located in some counties once a satisfactory re-inspection has been obtained. View Memo 20099 for details.
Effective Sunday, October 11th, Orion Lending will begin assessing a Flood Certificate and Tax Service Fee as identified on the State Fee Schedule. Government and Conventional Fees have also been consolidated into a single category. Updates to its State Fee Schedule are available in the Resources Section on the Orion website.
Capital Markets
Mortgage rates are a function of supply and demand, and there’s a lot of supply. The market produced $734.5 billion of new single-family MBS backed by newly minted home loans during the second quarter, a 57% increase from the previous period. Primary market originations were also up, but by a lesser 38%. The resulting securitization rate for the second quarter was 79%, a big jump from the 70% rate in the first quarter.
Last week we saw economic data supporting expectations of a strong rebound in GDP when the advance estimate is released later this month. 661,000 jobs were added in September, below market expectations and continuing the trend of monthly declines following June’s massive 4.8 million net new jobs. 12.5 million people remain officially unemployed and the unemployment rate dipped to 7.86 percent as nearly 900,000 workers left the labor force. Initial jobless claims remain roughly four times higher than pre-recession levels at 837,000 for the week ending September 26. The expiration of the CARES Act brought a decline in nominal income of 2.7 percent in August as enhanced unemployment benefits came to an end. The personal savings rate remained above its pre-crisis level at 14.1 percent though lower than its peak of 33.6 percent in April. Inflation adjusted consumer spending increased in August. Total mortgage purchase applications dipped, led by refi apps being down 6.5 percent for the week ending September 25 although bother remain well above their pace from one year ago. Rates continue to remain low and housing inventory remains tight in many parts of the country.
We all expected to see moves in the bond market from the September payrolls report on Friday, but we were thrown a bit of a curveball when President Trump revealed that he had tested positive for the coronavirus, which increased uncertainty to the week's chaotic news cycle. Treasuries ended Friday pulling back in curve-steepening fashion while the UMBS30 basis ended the week mostly tighter. In Washington, House Speaker Pelosi indicated that aid to airlines is forthcoming, but a broader deal has yet to be reached.
The September jobs report underwhelmed on most fronts, pointing to a slowdown in hiring as job gains slowed in September, a drop in the labor force participation rate as many Americans quit looking for work, a jump in the number of unemployed for 27 weeks or more. The pace of layoffs remains high, and total employment remains 7 percent below its February level. It should be noted that government employment fell by 216,000 this month, driven by large declines in the state and local education sectors. Hopefully that changes with more schools transitioning back to in-person learning. Markets also received a better than expected Michigan Consumer Sentiment Survey for September although it never moves rates.
The economic calendar is quite light today, though it begins shortly with the final September Markit Services PMI which will be followed by ISM non-manufacturing PMI for September and the September Employment Trends Index. We also have some Fed speak ahead of the release of the FOMC minutes later this week, with Richmond’s Barkin, Chicago’s Evans and Atlanta’s Bostic taking the virtual stage. Things pick back up tomorrow with the August Trade Balance and August job openings. The midweek session sees the September FOMC Minutes and August Consumer Credit before Thursday’s heavy calendar, which includes the September NFIB Small Business Optimism Index and $23 billion 30-year Treasury bond reopening results. The week closes with August Wholesale Inventories. The Desk is scheduled to conduct three operations today, including two in Class A. The operations will total up to $7.3 billion starting and ending with $2.9 billion UMBS30 2% and 2.5% with $1.5 billion GNII 2% and 2.5% in between. We begin today with Agency MBS prices nearly unchanged from Friday’s close but the 10-year is yielding .72 after closing last week at 0.70 percent.
Employment
A CEO with over twenty years of experience running a mortgage banking operation, exclusively in the DTC space, is looking to scale production by partnering with an entity that shares similar enthusiasm towards the DTC space. Presently, the company is operating as a licensed lender. The team's core competency is building and scaling call center sales and operations teams. The team is also tech-savvy and supports innovations in the digital and online mortgage process, along with an Omni-channel approach to marketing and lead generation. Product competency includes Non-QM, FHA, Conventional, Jumbo, and Second Liens. For more information, please contact Anjelica Nixt.
“Vice President, Business Innovation! At PCMA, we are building a unique company focused on developing Private Client products for high capacity borrowers. As the leader of the Process Innovation Team and steward of our “Zero-Defect” mission, we seek a candidate with the ability to assess technology solutions, organizational analysis, and collaborate with Implementation team in software development for accelerated growth. This is a highly visible and lucrative opportunity for the right candidate. Visit www.pcma.us.com to learn more about our firm, our principles, and our culture. Confidential submission of interest to: apply@pcma.us.com.”
“Are you wanting a sustainable work/life balance AND build a successful career? You can have both with Angel Oak Home Loans Consumer Direct Division. We are a full-service mortgage lender that provides a positive and flexible work culture along with training and opportunities designed towards career growth within the company. We believe that the company who hires the best and retains the best wins! Leadership support, marketing, lead generation, advanced technology and excellent benefits are just some of the advantages of working at Angel Oak Consumer Direct. The inside sales department at Angel Oak Consumer Direct Charlotte is now hiring and various positions available. View the loan officer role and the processor role. Contact Ed Powell for further questions.”