Kate Berry

The FHA is expected to announce at the end of this month that it will need a bailout for the first time in its 79-year history.

A fair-housing group is trying to crank up the pressure on Bank of America to settle claims that the bank discriminated against minorities by failing to maintain foreclosed properties.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac failed to pursue and collect deficiencies from foreclosed borrowers who had the ability to repay, according to an inspector general's report released Tuesday.

Wingspan Portfolio Advisors, a mortgage service provider, has agreed to take over the lease on a customer service operation in Monroe, La., from JPMorgan Chase (JPM) with the help of state subsidies.

The Central Bank's surprise decision to continue buying mortgage bonds may not spark another refinancing boom, but it could spur more home purchases.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are about to get tougher on banks and other lenders that cut corners when originating mortgages and try to sell them to the government-sponsored enterprises.

Three years after constructing a database aimed at standardizing the home appraisal process, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are still finding serious discrepancies in many appraisals submitted by mortgage lenders.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency is urging banks to strengthen their oversight of the home appraisal process and warning them to keep an eye out for a sudden spike in delinquencies on home-equity loans.

Some mortgage experts are criticizing a recent rule change by the Federal Housing Administration that would allow borrowers who lost their homes to foreclosure or a short sale to qualify for a new mortgage in as little as a year.

Wells Fargo, the nation's largest mortgage lender, is exploring the sale of some servicing rights because the market is flush with potential buyers and it sees little opportunity to cross-sell many servicing clients.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Fed Staff Violates Rules: It's not just the banks, folks, it's also the regulators. The Federal Reserve's inspector general says the Fed violated its own rules when a staff member inadvertently emailed minutes from a March policy meeting a day early. Oops. The email went to 150 people including some of the biggest banks and investment firms on Wall Street plus congressional staffers. The IG says the Fed failed to provide sufficient training to employees handling confidential information. Wall Street Journal, New York Times

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has created an online guide to help the roughly 25% of U.S. public service workers eliminate their student loans.

If the suit is settled, JPMorgan would become the fourth — and largest — bank to resolve allegations that it fraudulently sold poorly underwritten loans to Fannie and Freddie.

Three of the four largest mortgage servicers failed to meet Fannie Mae's minimum servicing requirements in the first half of 2013, according to a Fannie report released Tuesday.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is expected to issue subpoenas to mortgage servicers to find out if borrowers in foreclosure are being overcharged by third-party vendors or paying for services that were not actually delivered.

Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase are the latest servicers to say they have fulfilled their obligations related to the national mortgage settlement. The five servicers covered by the deal say they have provided more than $50 billion in consumer relief, double what was required.

Fannie Mae used its authority over Bank of America's sales of mortgage-servicing rights to resolve a bitter dispute involving mortgage repurchases, the inspector general of the Federal Housing Finance Agency says.

With interest rates rising, lenders are pushing hybrid adjustable-rate mortgages again. Lenders say borrowers like the lower monthly payments and the loans no longer have the onerous interest-only or balloon features that contributed to the housing crisis.

The cost of doing business with the Federal Housing Administration could skyrocket if the agency adopts a new method for calculating lenders' liability for poorly underwritten loans that default.

BlackRock, DoubleLine and Pimco filed a lawsuit Wednesday to try to stop the city of Richmond from buying and restructuring underwater mortgages through the use of eminent domain.