Price Adjustments coming soon to Conforming Mortgages

Last week, the FHFA (Federal Housing Finance Agency) announced changes to how conforming mortgages are priced with loan-level price adjustments (LLPAs). Some borrowers will find improved pricing where others will have to pay more in fees. The fees are typically incorporated into the interest rate for the mortgage.

From Fannie Mae’s Lender Letter dated January 19, 2023:

“We are implementing additional changes to our LLPA framework that represent the next step in our effort to increase support for borrowers historically underserved by the housing finance market…”.

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Big Expensive Changes for Second Homes and Investment Properties

Last night, Fannie Mae announced they are essentially going to be limiting how many second homes and investment properties they will provide mortgages for. This is largely due to the additional risk associated with second homes and investment properties. This goes into effect with loans delivered to Fannie Mae on April 1, 2021 – which pretty much means “immediately” as mortgage loans are delivered to Fannie Mae (or Freddie Mac) after they close…sometimes weeks after they close with the originating mortgage company. [Read more…]

Appraisals waived for some refinances!

mortgageporterhomeFannie Mae will begin offering appraisal waivers on some refinance transactions. This is great news as it will help transactions that qualify have a quicker closing and help reduce the work load for appraisers which will hopefully help expedite current appraisal turn-times. This will also help home owners save money on their transaction by not having to pay an appraisal fee, which have gone up dramatically over the last few months. [Read more…]

What’s trending? How about your credit report.

2014-06-20_0758Fannie Mae is introducing a new format for credit reports called “trending credit data”.  Typically a credit report shows more of a snapshot of what someone’s credit looks like today with late payments as a summary, more or less. Fannie Mae’s “trending” report will actually show a detailed 24 month history of each payment and the balance of that account for every month for the last 24 months. [Read more…]

Fannie Mae no longer requires revolving debts to be closed

MortgageThis week, Fannie Mae issued new underwriting guidelines for conforming loans approved through DU (Fannie Mae’s automated underwriting system). One of the new guidelines that is catching a lot of attention is that Fannie Mae will no longer require that revolving debts that are paid off in order to reduce a borrowers debt to income ratios and help them qualify, to also be closed.  The new guidelines will allow a revolving debts that are paid down to zero balance to no longer be factored for qualifying purposes.

If I can help you with your purchase or refi mortgage needs for your home located anywhere in Washington state, please contact me.

 

Fannie Mae offering Home Buyer Incentives

mortgageporterraiseFannie Mae is offering first time home buyers up to 3% towards closing cost when they purchase a Fannie Mae HomePath property. On a $300,000 home, 3% would be up to $9,000 towards allowable closing cost!  A Fannie Mae HomePath property is a home that Fannie Mae has foreclosed on and now owns.

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How will Fannie Mae’s Collateral Underwriter (CU) impact appraisals?

detctiveOver this weekend (April 18, 2015), Fannie Mae will be releasing the highly anticipated “Collateral Underwriter” (aka CU) to lenders. CU is intended to be a tool for lenders to use to help ensure the quality of appraisals on loans that originated as conventional/Fannie Mae. Fannie Mae’s tagline for CU is “Taking appraisal review to the next level”…many in the industry, from lenders, real estate brokers and appraisers, are a bit anxious over this new “tool”.

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Lenders Increasing Extension Fees

I’m receiving notices from a couple  of the lenders we work with that they are temporarily increasing rate lock extension fees due to Fannie Mae’s increased guarantee fees (LLPA) that will hit us in 2014.  An extension fee is an additional cost that may be charged in order to keep a rate locked when the rate lock is expiring.

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