The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is giving the 17 or so participants in its "small business" review panel five additional days to offer comments on the agency's mortgage banking compensation proposals.
Late Monday night the agency sent out notice to participants saying, "We have been informed that there are follow-up questions on the proposal under consideration whether to require that origination fees in transactions with creditor-paid and brokerage-paid compensation be "flat," i.e., do not vary with the size of the loan."
To address these questions, the CFPB is holding a conference call Wednesday, June 6 at 1 p.m. Eastern time.
A copy of the email was provided to National Mortgage News. A CFPB spokeswoman did not return an email about the matter.
About two weeks ago the agency invited mortgage professionals who work at "small" firms—less than $7 million in annual revenue—to discuss its compensation proposals which stretch almost 40 pages. They were then asked to submit comments to the agency about the proposal.
The first CFPB forum/meeting was called under the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act.
One participant in that meeting told National Mortgage News that he feels the agency "is trying to do the right thing," adding that there is much confusion about when (and if) flat compensation is mandated in a mortgage transaction.
"You have borrower-paid flat fee, and then lender-paid, and now you have a new category: brokerage-paid," he said, requesting his name not be used. "They [the CFPB] were handed this mess. I think they want to do the right thing. I hope they do the right thing."
