Economy

In a bid to cut time and costs from the mortgage process, Fannie Mae is testing whether appraisers can accurately determine a home's value without actually visiting the property.

Freddie Mac has quietly started extending credit to nonbanks that issue mortgages, a move it says will help the companies maintain access to a crucial stockpile of cash if their home loans go sour.

Fannie Mae's first-quarter profits were enough for it to rebuild its minimum capital buffer and pay the Treasury Department dividend after being forced to take a draw during the previous fiscal period.

In its latest effort to reach first time home buyers, Freddie Mac is launching a new 3% down payment program that casts aside a number of restrictions in its existing low down payment offerings.

If Freddie Mac's credit-risk transfer activities continue to grow, mortgage lenders could eventually see a reduction in the guarantee fees they pay to the government-sponsored enterprise, according to CEO Donald Layton.

Borrowers can get better rates elsewhere, so they're repaying ahead of schedule, leaving banks in the lurch. The steps lenders would have to take to keep the business could be prohibitively expensive.

The future secondary mortgage market entities will receive high investment grade ratings, even as there is no clarity on their scope or form, Fitch Ratings said.

The increase in the delinquency rate for securitized CRE loans for March ended an eight-month streak of declines.

Momentum to overhaul the mortgage finance system had been slipping, and with Democrats divided over the Senate's banking relief bill there's virtually no chance more bipartisan deals can be worked out.

The annual progress report on the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac conservatorships reiterated that a new credit score model will likely not be operational until after the implementation of a new Single Security Initiative.