This time, it’s Freedom Mortgage to the tune of $113 million. Same story, the Department of Justice, under the False Claims Act, brought the action against Freedom for violations in the FHA insurance program resulting in losses sustained by FHA. About a week ago, Freedom agreed to the settlement without admitting liability, but it cost them big bucks just the…
Better late than never. The VA has issued their guidance for the disclosure of allowable fees to veterans for a VA guaranteed loan. VA Circular 26-16-11 (Exhibit A & Exhibit B) outlines how a lender should be disclosing allowable fees and charges and how a lender and seller credit should be reflected on the new Closing Disclosure to offset an…
Another shocking news headline! A new report by Trulia claims that the long-standing mortgage interest tax deduction available to all homeowners is mostly a benefit to white male homeowners (Inequality). Women and minorities are not getting the same benefit. The report goes on to show how a larger percentage of whites own homes (almost 63%), with the percent of those…
Most companies like to boast that they provide great customer service. I once attended a bank’s 5-year planning meeting where the facilitator asked, “How much do you, or can you, charge for your “great” customer service? Everyone went silent. The reality is that every customer expects to receive good service as part of the product and process. You wouldn’t expect to…
Seems people are always looking for shortcuts. Ways to get where they’re going more quickly or make what they need to do much easier. I’ve found that in all too many instances when looking for, and taking, these shortcuts it leads to more trouble than its worth, and it takes more time and effort to get where you want to…
“Lenders are doing a better job of originating loans with fewer defects,” according to a report provided by First American Financial Corp in a recent article appearing in National Mortgage News (Higher Spending on Compliance Results in Fewer Errors on Apps). The article stated that The First American Title Loan Application Defect Index decreased again in February after declining steadily…
